The Philadelphia Church of God has a new article up about how "sacred" their children are. It is an article by Dennis Leap, PCG's right hand code enforcer. One would think by reading the headline that PCG values their children as a gift from God. However, their actions towards children and the demolition of familial ties bear a striking alternative to this deceptive article.
Leap starts his article off with a blatant threat towards any true PCG member. Any questions they may have about PCG's child rearing practices are NOT to be questioned. PCG's understanding is a DIRECT revelation from their god. How dare anyone question that! Even though Flurry and crew made it all up, it is still directly from their god.
God’s Church’s teaching about child training is unique. Why? It has come by special revelation from God. How well do you understand what God has given His Church concerning child rearing?
Proper child rearing in the PCG cult can only happen when proper chain of command in a marriage takes place. Submission to government is the entire point of the "whole truth" that PCG is trumpeting. Subservient wives raise subservient children.Only God’s Church has knowledge about child rearing given directly by God. What God has revealed to the Church is the only reliable knowledge that gives the desired results. Herbert W. Armstrong was personally very excited about the new revelation given on child rearing. We should be too. But are we? If we are, then we will be putting what we’ve learned into practice.
Today we must make sure that we do get the whole truth on marriage, family and child rearing. God is helping us do that in a remarkable way. How? The Philadelphia Church of God must fight to preserve God’s truth. God knows that humans treasure what they have to fight for. But we don’t fight for the truth just so we can put it on a shelf. We fight to apply it! Jesus Christ not only used Mr. Armstrong to reveal His truth, He used Mr. Armstrong to show us how to put it into action. The end-time type of Elijah knew that coming to a full understanding of God’s revealed truth takes much hard work, which includes study, constant and consistent review, strong teaching on the part of the ministry, and daily practice.
PCG "fights" to preserve marriages by kicking out spouses, breaking up marriages where a spouse is a non-believer or worse yet, an EX COG member. That alone ranks right up there with the unpardonable sin in the PCG cult. Marriages have been ripped apart by the church telling wives to leave their husbands, or husbands to leave their unconverted wives behind. Because they are unconverted then they get special dispensation to remarry within the church, usually to PCG members approved by the hierarchy.
Even though the PCG only has "true" marriages, these marriages produce children that are almost immediately taken over by Satan.
“You need to know at what age Satan gets into your child’s mind. You need to know whether your child has access to God ….” You will not find these truths explained in any book from a bookstore. These are the deep thoughts of God that have been graciously given to us to use (1 Corinthians 2:10-12). We must study, believe, think about and learn to apply each of these in our family life.
Even though Satan immediately takes over their children's minds, their children are the ONLY children on the entire planet that God is working through! Imagine that! God only cares bout the children of the PCG members, and most particularly the children of the ELITE PCG staff in Edmond.
We need to take in the significance of what Christ has established through Mr. Armstrong. This truth holds incredible meaning for our children. Our children are not cut off from God. They have access to God. This means that our children are in a different category than all other children on the planet! Of course, God loves all the children in this world—John 3:16 tells us that—but God is only working closely with our children at this time.
Mr. Armstrong wrote, “While other people—not members of the true body of Christ—and all other children are cut off from access to God, your children—if you are a truly converted member of God’s Church—can believe in Christ—are not cut off from God—and much of God’s truth, even though as yet too young to be converted. But they are a special treasure to God!” (ibid). Do we get what Mr. Armstrong is teaching here? Children of members can have a relationship with Christ and come to understand God’s truth because of their parents’ calling. Mr. Armstrong adds that they are a special treasure to God. How inspiring, exciting and thrilling! Do we realize what a sacred treasure our children are?
It is important to keep their children's minds free from error:
Why should our young children be taught about God? Because God makes it possible for them to understand the truth! Do we get it? Our children can grasp the true gospel of Jesus Christ. Our children can know that God is a family into which they can be born. Our little toddlers can be taught to realize that God is offering them the opportunity to rule the universe. People in this world have such great difficulty accepting these wonderful truths of God because their minds are full of religious error. When parents faithfully do their part, a little child is able to grow up without being subjected to Satan’s religious deceit. Keeping our children’s minds free of error gives them an incredible edge in preparation for the Kingdom of God.
PCG accomplishes that by corporal punishment. Beating children into submission so they sit for two hours on a blanket. PCG accomplishes this by telling parents to kick teenagers out onto the street if they are the least bit rebellious.
Flurry goes on to quote HWA about his concerns in the early 1980's that huge numbers of young people were NOT continuing on in the church. Flurry and HWA blamed the parents. Never mind the fact that these youth saw the abuse, experienced the abuse, and lived the lies that the church was fostering off as "truth." When its very own leaders, from the top down (including Flurry), were corrupt to the core, why would these youth remain in a fraudulent organization?
In the early ’80s, many young people who were raised in the Church, did not grow up to become members of God’s Church. Mr. Armstrong was greatly disturbed by this trend. He placed the blame where it belonged—on the parents. He wrote, “Brethren, God’s Church is not showing even half the growth it should have from the oncoming generation of our members. This shows we have neglected the teaching of our children! When God has called you for special service in loyally backing the proclaiming of the gospel to the world by God’s Church, He intended that your children should also be called and enter into the Work of God’s Church” (ibid). Besides teaching our children about God, we must also teach them about His Work and show them how to back and support the Work. If our hearts are truly in the Work, this will not be difficult to accomplish.
Remember, as Flurry states above, children are in the church for the express purpose "entering into the the work" of the church, or in other-words - tithe paying money machines.
Flurry quotes HWA again,
“Although Satan is going to influence your children, almost from birth, toward his selfish and rebellious attitude, you may counteract this by teaching your children the truth about God! And when sufficiently adult they will be called. None of this is true of children outside truly converted parents!”
For a church that claims to be the only true church to ever exist in over 1,900 years, it has an INTENSE fear of Satan. They have given the Satan power over them by their fear. Most Christians (except for dispensationalists) do not live in this fear, only "true" Armstrong do.
The Philadelphia Church of God has a disgusting legacy of child abuse since its creation. That abuse is mental, physical and spiritual. It has lead to many suicides over the years. It has ripped apart marriages and families. How many more need to die before the sheeple wake up?
Read fourteen years worth of letters from ex-PCG members and children of members who ahve been abused here: Letters From Those Impacted By PCG.
7 comments:
On another blog, I recently exchanged comments with an insightful poster that have given me pause for thought as to how the cult members should be properly regarded. I used the term "disingenuous" to describe the methodology of the cult leaders. He used the term "complicit" to describe the attitude and approach of the membership, ie "sheep".
Taken together, we have a perverse form of a symbiotic relationship. In such a dominant-submissive relationship, the submissive one is really the one who possesses the control. However, the majority of the submissives in the ACOGs never seem to realize this, or to exercise their control in any sort of game-changing manner which would improve their condition or lot in life. Their behavior is similar to addiction to depressants, such as heroin or secobarbital. It makes feeling sorry for them, and about what happens to them very difficult because, obviously, being dominated is what they prefer. Hence, they allow and deserve it.
I could have placed this under either of the new posts on PCG, but I chose this one, because it is obvious that generations of members have been taught to be submissives from their early childhood. That is when their spirit first becomes broken.
BB
That's about as creepy as it gets...
Yea, they even let mentally ill, mentally unstable, depressed men like Dennis (Hitler) Leap, who runs around in his spandex shorts at PYC Camp, write articles about child rearing.
And I noticed all those hierarchy NEVER throw THEIR kids out the door! Only other peoples'
That looks like a picture from the "Children of the Corn".
Of course, it could be PCG children dropped off in the mall by their parents by order of PCG ministers after they grew up to be teenagers.
The PCG is full of corn and even Dr. Stanley Schmidt, former editor of Analog thinks so as described in his editorial.
[For those of you unfamiliar with the phrase 'full of corn', it is a reference to the moonshine made from corn. This is appropriate because the Armstrongist churches of God are filled with boozers who have taken over the administration and the complicit who look forward to drinking as much as they can afford, particularly at the Feast of Tabernacles. Therefore, The Children of the Corn are teenagers who have grown up in the PCG.
Is that insulting enough?
I have been trying to hone my mocking skills.]
I'm so glad I broke free from the Armstrong grinding wheel at age 18. I'm so, so glad.
And yet as much as I care to never give the whole "church" experience another thought, popping over to this site every once in a while to read another story about all the sick branches of this twisted cult flailing, withering and dying is oddly satisfying.
But these poor kids. I hope when the CoGs finally wheeze out their inevitable, last gasping death rattle they too can experience that exhilarating moment of clarity and freedom and never look back.
Let me tell you, as a product of said "child rearing" in the 60's, I have a very hard time even sitting in the same room as my mother even now. If only I had been hit with a rolled up newspaper instead of a bread board. My dog had a better "rearing" than I did.
Mikey --
I appreciated the information about "full of corn."
The cinema buff in me can't help pointing out that the still is, actually, from Village of the Damned, a 1959 adaptation of a novel called The Midwich Cuckoos. A whole town blacks out, and there is an alien spaceship observed in the center. Everyone wakes up and seems fine . . . but EVERY woman in Midwich soon discovers she's pregnant. The children, when born, are strange, taciturn, anti-social except among themselves, malevolent, and exhibit powers.
Is this fodder for more commentary re: COG children or what?
Post a Comment