Gerald Flurry recently bought his own jet for the exclusive use of he and his immediate family. The reason he bought the jet was so he would not have to fly sitting next to some disease ridden member of the public or gods forbid if he had to stand in line for the security check. Nothing could be more humiliating for the prophet of god having his crotch touched by an over-zealous TSA agent.
The Philadelphia Church of God has been working over time in finding every imaginable excuse in justifying the purchase of the jet. Now the son of PCG's most abusive ministers (Wayne Turgeon) has written an article, Flying Solo, that is featured on the PCG web site about his recent training on how to be a flight steward on his grand-daddy's private play toy.
PCG sent Grant Turgeon off to Long Beach recently to train how to be a steward on a private jet. Only the elite relatives of Flurry are allowed to fly on the jet, so there could never possibly be a lay member trained to do this job.
As soon as I opened the front door, something felt different. The date was June 19, my first day of a week-long course at Flight Safety International in Long Beach, California. Through nearly 40 hours of lectures and drills, I became certified as a cabin attendant for the Philadelphia Church of God’s new Gulfstream 450 aircraft.In his very next paragraph, he talks about the intense persecution he received as a high school student playing basket ball. The reason for this is that he used his time in Long Beach as an opportunity to witness about the glories of his grand father establishing the most amazing work the world has ever seen. In high school, he did not have the balls to stand up for his faith due to being surrounded by the heathen unconverted spawn of pagans.
Ever since finding out about the training course a few days before it started, I had been bracing myself for the worst but still hoping for the best. It brought to mind an uncomfortable encounter as a 15-year-old high school baseball player back in 2008 when I was relentlessly ridiculed and harassed by my freshman teammates, and even the older players, for being the only kid who couldn’t participate in games on Friday nights or Saturdays, who disappeared for a week in October to attend the Feast of Tabernacles (or to sacrifice animals at the temple, as they jokingly claimed), who chose not to attend parties, and who refused to experiment with alcohol and drugs.
Now that Grant considers himself one of the most converted young men on earth today, he started imagining how he could witness to his instructors and class mates.Of course, this was nine years ago in the absurdly popularity-obsessed environment of public school, in which teenagers probe for any peculiarity in their peers and then attack it relentlessly, just to avoid being picked on themselves for their own insecurities. Realistically, I understood that my time at Flight Safety International, surrounded mostly by adults twice my age and older, wouldn’t be quite as laden with persecution.
Still, I knew that God’s way of life always attracts curiosity, whether good or bad. When I entered the training center, I could only pray that the curiosity of my fellow students and my instructors would be of the more pleasant variety.Never fear, the god of PCG was quick to intervene and use Grant as a witness to the majestic lifestyle of Gerald Flurry. His classmates were SHOCKED to learn he was working for his grandfather, Gerald. SHOCKED!!!!!!!!!
On the third day of training, one of the instructors asked my three female classmates and me how well we knew the principal passenger on the private planes where we would be working. After some hesitation, I explained that I would be flying with my grandfather.
This was shocking, apparently. My answer invited an onslaught of incredulous yet positive comments and questions, since working for a relative in the flight business is practically unheard of. Would my grandfather even make me wear a uniform? What meals does he prefer? How easy is he to get along with? Where will we be traveling?
His class mates were astounded by Grant's time teaching them about the one true church and they were amazed and excited. Apparently, these trainees already knew Gerald Flurry was the smartest man on earth.During a mid-morning break a couple hours later, one of my classmates asked me several questions about my grandfather. I told her his name and pointed out that he is the presenter of the Key of David television program, one of the three or four largest religious telecasts in the United States. She asked to see what he looks like, so I pulled out my phone and showed her the introduction to one of the programs on YouTube.
Her excited reaction revealed that she had seen Mr. Flurry before. She quickly called across the lounge to her boyfriend, a pilot who was taking a different training course that same week. He was happy to meet the grandson of a man whom he frequently watches on tv. According to this pilot, Mr. Flurry is “smart” and “really knows his stuff.” I agreed.
Grant now had the opportunity at lunch time to tell the complete story of the miraculous emergence of the greatest Church of God in this age.Following a morning of practicing in-flight food preparation, teachers and students gathered beneath a flight simulator in the warehouse for the only group lunch of the week. The timing was impeccable, just a few hours after the whole crew had discovered my family relation to the big boss.
Questions came my way, so I answered. Do I plan to enter the ministry like Mr. Flurry? “No; no one in this Church plans to.” Why would some pcg members travel several hours to attend Church services each week? “Because they are deeply committed to their beliefs.” With every answer I gave, the people around me realized more and more how vastly different this way of life is.
“Why did your grandfather choose to become a minister?” one middle-aged female instructor asked as the other teachers and students got up to wash their dishes. I replied that it was the last career he would have chosen; as a young man, he used to criticize his mother for listening to the radio program of Worldwide Church of God founder Herbert W. Armstrong, the predecessor to Mr. Flurry and the pcg. But as his life spiraled out of control, he couldn’t help but notice how happy and stable his mother was. Since his father wasn’t the best role model, he came to see Mr. Armstrong as his spiritual father.
Later on, I continued, Mr. Flurry attended the wcg’s educational institution, Ambassador College, which was located in Pasadena—just a short drive from Flight Safety International. After three years as an older, married student, he was hired to write for the Church’s world news publication, The Plain Truth, only to be fired about a year later.
At this point, a field minister asked Mr. Flurry to be a ministerial trainee under him. Finally, I told my instructor, he became a minister and has remained in that capacity for nearly 50 years. Because the wcg changed its mission under new leadership following Mr. Armstrong’s death in 1986, Mr. Flurry started the pcg in 1989 and has worked to uphold Mr. Armstrong’s legacy ever since.
Grant felt deeply inspired by his experience and the chance to witness the glorious truth about his grandfather to his trainee mates. This time he was not a weak immature high school student too afraid to witness to his basketball teammates. God used him as a witness to the unconverted.In practical terms, I explained, this means starting colleges in Oklahoma and England, hosting renowned musical geniuses in an annual concert series at Armstrong Auditorium, excavating biblical remains in Jerusalem, delivering a hope-filled message through every possible digital and print medium, and even acquiring a private aircraft for the purpose of traveling the world and encouraging thousands of dedicated pcg members.
Now Grant wants to use this experience as a tool to teach the youth of PCG to always be ready with an answer when asked and to never be afraid. So the next time someone questions a PCG member about the mindless purchase of the jet, they will be ready to step forward with an answer.
During my week in California, I also learned the true meaning of the Apostle Peter’s admonition: “But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear” (1 Peter 3:15).
Never once in his entire week of training did Grant ever talk about Jesus. It was all about Gerald Flurry, Mystery of the Ages and Lil'Stevie's pathetic and deceptive book, Raising the Ruins. Since Jesus has never been part of the Philadelphia empire, it is no wonder Grant was incapable of talking or witnessing about Christ to these pagans.In other words, God’s people, including the youth, must have the humility and the understanding to give honest answers about our way of life, which fills us with a living hope. Sometimes, this goes beyond explaining why we keep the Sabbath and the holy days, or why we don’t eat pork. At Flight Safety International, I was hardly asked a single doctrinal question. Instead, I had to know some of the fruits of God’s Work, as well as some of the history of the Church. The Autobiography of Herbert W. Armstrong and Raising the Ruins are outstanding resources for building this knowledge.
One of the mantras of the Church of God has always been, "be ready to give an answer." Of course, that "answer" was always about justifying Herbert Armstrong or some other COG leader or doctrine. It never included mentioning Jesus. God forbid a true COG member would EVER discuss Jesus with pagans!!!!!! Ghastly days!
Notice: We are encouraged to “give an answer.” This implies that someone asked a question first. One thing that makes God’s Church vastly different from any other church is that we do not initiate religious discussions. We do not go door to door with the gospel. We do not argue for hours with unconverted family members, trying to convince or force them to come into the Church. We do not embark on missionary journeys to baptize pagans in Africa and South America.
But, if asked, we should have been paying enough attention during Church services, and exerting enough effort in personal Bible study, to give a satisfactory answer.
God’s way of life works. People are naturally intrigued by it. It is up to us to set a right example and to give an answer that would make God proud.God's way of life does work if the person is following Jesus, but does a COG way of life work as a way of making God proud? Considering the horrific track record of the Philadelphia Church of God in leading people to suicide, breaking up families and marriages and teaching members to abandon handicapped children in the mall, how could God EVER be proud of the PCG?
27 comments:
God’s way of life works.
Sorry Grant but it didn't work for me. And I tried it longer than you have been alive. You're brainwashed and still a wet-behind-the-ears kid.
Obviously, Grant has acquired superb skills as a spin doctor. It'd be nice if somehow we could have a discussion with his fellow students to learn their real opinions. Honestly, it's tempting to believe that his narrative was constructed for the benefit of his grandfather. I've been to a lot of classes, meetings, and focus groups over the years, and this isn't the way culties or even devout mainstream Christians are generally received. But, whatever floats your boat!
BB
Unless the PCG starts meeting world dignitaries, Herbie style, with the help of that plane in the not too distant future, it will be a white elephant.
It's so expensive for such a small church. I bet many of its members drive old cars.
The kid is just as delusional as old man Flurry.
Just awful seeing how peoples' hopes and fears have been exploited to fund this terribly extravagant purchase of a jet.
***
Grant Turgeon writes, "After three years as an older, married student, [Gerald Flurry] was hired to write for the Church’s world news publication, The Plain Truth, only to be fired about a year later."
Could Grant Turgeon explain why it is that there is not one issue of The Plain Truth that features Gerald Flurry's name? Not even once. If Gerald Flurry did write for The Plain Truth he got no credit in the recruitment magazine for such writings.
Within the pages of The Plain Truth recruitment magazine there is no evidence that Gerald Flurry ever wrote for it.
Grant Turgeon fails to provide any proof that Gerald Flurry actually wrote for The Plain Truth recruitment magazine.
As we know, they follow a man. Instead of being about Jesus, it's about following
hwa legacy. Right from the grandson's mouth.
You shall have no other God's (hwa) before you.
I wonder what his salary is?
`The man boy is the product of his lifetime of limited programming. I suspect he simply can't help being who he is and thinks his church and grandfather is. He has evidently known nothing else and to step outside boxes he is stuck in has negative spritual and eternal consequences which he believes. He's a good candidate for a mid life crisis enhanced by the classic "Dark Night of the Soul" experience.
Having grown up in a much bigger theological box than WCG, I was able to not buy into any number of beliefs and speculations within the Church deemed important when they weren't. Those who grew up in it are not so blessed. They either never think of any other way of being or the fear of doing so and the consequences seem real and undesirable.
For better or worse, as conscious human beings, we remember everything that imprints on our memories and we drag them into our adult lives no matter how long ago and even knowing they don't serve us in the present. Grant's experience of "getting to be the steward" is probably pretty heady stuff for the man boy. As a minister, of course, he is not trained in anything real in ministry or theology. He is simply a compliant Bible reader in the family biz parroting what he has heard all his life and seems to be what the Bible says , as if it mattered what the Bible says . (Sorry...that is just the bottom line I myself have come to conclude because of knowing so many man boy types who read the Bible like CNN and filter every event including the weather through it.).
I wonder if Bob Thiel spin Hurricane Harvey as a Biblical event as God "tries to get our attention" through weather which He only controls and causes to be. Stupid ignorance on parade. He can hardly ignore it "prophetically" due to the carnage it is causing. Whatever he says will be piously conviction with marginal information and understanding of reality at best.
Anyway...Grant may also be exaggerating the comments and interests of those around him at his training session in Long Beach. He may be conflicted in his soul already and desperately seeking approval hearing what he wants to hear and exaggerating the questions and interests of others. A simple conversation on "how did you come to take this class" may also be overblown in his mind and in the telling. Humans tend to do that as well when in need of affirmation and confirmation of their views in their own minds. Rubbing shoulders alone with the world may have produced a bit of an exaggerated experience.
Bottom line. He can't help it. It's all he knows and all that the program in his mind contains. When Grandpa dies, and he will before any Christ returns, he can be steward to his equally ill informed and experienced dad.
@ Redfox
Could Grant Turgeon explain why it is that there is not one issue of The Plain Truth that features Gerald Flurry's name? Not even once.
You are mistaken. Look for "Jerry Flurry" -- he's there, with a small handful of articles.
Dennis,
Every person who ever lived goes through the man-boy phase. There's no way around it. 'Prove all things' is a time consuming, ongoing process. But life demands that decisions be made. So in the meanwhile, before sufficient knowledge is acquired, one has to lean on the culture and those around them.
It's only if people give up on growing in knowledge, or refuse to bow to new understanding, that's damning.
It is, after all, the memories and experiences stuck in our heads that fuels our need to express and talk about them . These experiences have had literal consequences and thus the need to find others to help us proces them. Hopefully without rancor and hostility.
I find myself now actually at the age and time in life where as a young man the church promised retirement , now sign off on SS and we'll take care of everything. For years I wondered and worried about this , thinking I was still in the right place, doing the right things for the right reasons....untilI allowed the doubts and questions to be greater than the apologetics I could come up with for myself.
The consequences of having done so are now showing up in force. How ironic it is I find myself living in a single room (and I have to move from again due to the owners selling and returning to California) just two blocks from the Baptist Church HWA was baptized in and walking the same streets he did back in the day. Some kinda Karma or closure for me I suppose. While I have had 20 years self employed in therapeutic massage, which fits my personality well , I consider myself to have classically underachieved due to believing when young I was supposed to be a minister, for many reasons personal and otherwise. I can't live on what SS provides so we'll see. I always hope Joe Tkach Jr is enjoying his dinners out , Rolex watch collection and retirement in Charlotte. Affording things these days is an issue and coming from a family where Kodak took excellent care of my dad even after they went bust for almost as long as he worked for them up until he passed just short of 100, it all seems so ironic. Kodak was more trustable than the glorious and righteous church of God and it's God appointed leadership. What's with that?
All that to mean the program runs deep and the consequences do come around to be deallt with best we can. I am grateful for having had BannedHWA to process my own experiences and the consequences that follow and always will.
Thanks too for those of you who reached back over the years in a positive way . It helps....
Kodak was more trustable than the glorious and righteous church of God and it's God appointed leadership.
Because they went to Ambassador College when they were still so young, many WCG ministers have no idea of what the working world is like outside of WCG and the splinters. Ordinary members who go to work at their group's headquarters will routinely observe that the ministers' conduct is far less "Christian" than what they have experienced in "the world." AC-trained ministers, however, will routinely play the "corporate" game and do whatever it takes to get ahead, even if this means lying and backstabbing, because they tell themselves they are doing it "for God."
"Rubbing shoulders alone with the world may have produced a bit of an exaggerated experience."
Quite insightfull comment.
On the whole a kind comment toward the man boy and Karma will reward you for it. Although for now it seems Karma is drawing you closer and closer to the "HWA eperience tour". If this goes on one day you may find your head resting on "the prayer rock."
I just looked up a church friend on facebook from many ages ago. His house has drowned in Houston. Not that this comment helps in any way although it expresses my personal motto.
nck
Did he attend the KEVIN OWEN DEAN Flight Attendant School For Boys??
I went to the PYC, PCG's youth camp and had lots of contact with the mini version of Wayne Turgeon. Grant is a conceited piece of shit like his dad. Arrogant and egotistical who thinks his shit does not stink. Because of who his dad is and who his grandfather is he felt he could do and say anything he wanted and treat us like dirt and none of us could do anything about it. The best gift t the world could receive in regards to PCG's jet is that it crashes and kills these abusive people. These people have destroyed my family and taken our money. I hate every single one of them!
8.04 AM
Another reminder that parents can give their children all sorts of stuff, but they can't give them character. No matter the parent.
His neutral gender orientation should help him to be a really sweet stewardess. You go boy!
11.07 AM
I think you're hitting below the belt.
Grant is a looser living off of the tithes of the brethren. Throw him in the real world and he won't be able to survive.....I guess it pays to be a Flurry.....Turgeon in this case.
His neutral gender orientation should help him to be a really sweet stewardess. You go boy!
He and Ryan Malone must get along very well together!
"He and Ryan Malone must get along very well together!"
Yes! I know both of these guys and you are so RIGHT!
Isn't nepotism a wonderful invention, especially if the people in charge have stupid, lazy or incompetent offspring, and most do.
It exists in American business, but is absolutely rampant in American Churches. Christianity might die out in four or five hundred years if it weren't for the preacher's stupid kids who need a job where they don't need to work hard or have half a brain. And the preacher's incompetent kids have a better standard of living than most of the congregation. Yes, most in the congregation are a brainless lot too. Please slap me down again Mr. Preacher, I think I like it.
I'm curious about the costs versus benefits of this jet. I don't know what the Philadelphia revenue is but I wouldn't imagine it's much more than about 25 million per year. The annual cash outlay for payments on a used Gulfstream 450 plus insurance, hangar fees, wages to the various workers associated with it, fuel, maintenance and repairs, and who knows what else probably run around two million per year. I suppose if the building loans have been retired, then the funds that had been going to those payments would be available for this. Yet the outlay each year is still a pretty big percentage of the revenue.
Gordon.
You are looking from a business perspective. That is not the way these topics are evaluated.
When HWA contemplated building the auditorium. He asked for pledges. If the pledges were sufficient and premium insurers would give a green light, he would take it as a clear sign of an open door from God Almighty.
That is the frame of reference.
Cost versus benefit is Tkachian speak about planes or managerial style. Not entrepreneurial.
nck
Dennis said, "Kodak was more trustable than the glorious and righteous church of God and it's God appointed leadership".
MY COMMENT - A sad but condemning truth about those who inherited the work of Herbert Armstrong. Not only was Kodak more trustable, the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation created by the US Government as well as the US Government itself was much more trustable than the Worldwide Church of God. The same Worldwide Church of God that preached and predicted the USA would be bombed to smithereens by the Germans in 1972 turned out to be more trustable.
Dennis, I always feel angry when I am reminded how the WCG cheated you out of your retirement after 25+ years of service. You had more integrity than any of those hirelings who either left to Splinters or stayed with little Joey Tkach. Your attorney said it all, "And this is a Church?"
Richard
Turdgeon looks like he has fetal alcohol syndrome.
Is that possible?
Nepotism, money money money.
Alcoholism is a huge issue in the PCG. Many of the HQ ministry and field ministry are alcoholics. Many of them never learned from Flurry's mistake
Thanks for the comment, Anonymous 6:49. I was not aware that Gerald Flurry had written articles for The Plain Truth under the name Jerry Flurry.
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