For many years now we have heard from former Restored Church of God members and from Dave Pack himself on how everything is "in common" because as God's only true representative on earth, he and he alone is the rightful heir to all money, property, retirement income and anything else he can con people out of.
Thanks to the constant flow of money into his compound he lives rent-free in a church-owned home, drives a church-owned car (on the rare occasions he says he drives off the compound) and receives a large salary. With all of the money flowing in he has been able to build the most superfantabulous campus the world has ever laid eyes on. The place reeks of money, but don't tell that to the employees though.
Most corporations, churches, and small businesses provide coffee, tea, and snacks for the employees as a thank-you for services well done. Dave Pack takes this one step further though, he does provide coffee for the employees BUT charges EVERYONE $15.00 a month to partake. With 20 employees that would take in over $300.00 a month in coffee taxes. 20 people do NOT drink that much coffee and tea or use that many sugars, cream, stirrers, napkins, etc. Even if you don't drink his coffee you still required to pay the coffee tax.
Can Dave Pack truly be this big of a cheapskate?
I'm just glad I don't have to WASTE 15 dollars a month on the RCG mandatory coffee fund anymore. That alone was one of the things that made me realize these people were money hungry. Every single employee was forced to pay 15 dollars a month whether they were a drinker of coffee or not for this fund that most likely always had excess cash left.
The coffee tastes burnt and you got basic cream, honey, and coffee. At my current Job, they offer more than seven varieties of coffee and even more varieties of creams, sweeteners, and toppings. They are constantly boosting employees moral by allowing us to matter, and express our ideas on how to make the company more efficient, they celebrate us, give bonuses as they are able, pay into our health. Guess what, employees add value to this company.
At RCG, people pay 1st tithe, 2nd tithe, 3rd tithe, tithe of tithe, excess second tithe must be returned after FOT, offerings, coffee fund (Employees only), spokesman club fees, members are exhorted to pay into the funds for socials, must participate in fundraising which is never to the outside world but between congregations and on and on and on. This is all truly exacerbated when you work directly at rcg and are expected to wear, suits, ties, oxford shoes, maintain a clean haircut look, shave, have crisp ironed dressed shirts and shined shoes, eat healthily, maintain a decent vehicle and clean home, host for visiting members, all WHILE MAKING MINIMUM WAGE OR VERY CLOSE TO IT.
Then employees are spoken down to and made small in staff meetings and no one likes to raise their hand and offer suggestions or express concerns because the "baby face" "golden boys" "yes men" who do nothing but gossip about each others counsel sessions with members will pounce on you and correct you for appearing to cause "DIVISION".
I CANT HELP BUT POUR OUT MY HEART WHEN I SEE THESE POSTS. THIS PLACE IS THE TRUE SWAMP THAT NEEDS TO BE CLEANED UP.
I feel pain for the good people still there being tossed to and from like chaff in the wind.
Dave's misguided and sadly mistaken ministry's days are numbered. No one wants to take up his mental...mantle and get stuck with all the baggage he has created for himself and all that follow. No one wants to get stuck trying to pay for all the goodies Dave has over done for such a minuscule church. His property will be sold off in time for who knows what not related on bit to his great goals. The RCG members are busy building for others to take a firesale prices.
ReplyDeleteWhy he even has followers is an enigma to me but truly there is a butt for every seat. Even the ones that evidently gyrate almost weekly at RCG for no good reason if we go by Dave's theological batting averages and history.
His property will be sold off in time for who knows what not related on bit to his great goals.
ReplyDeleteMaybe Giant Eagle needs a new corporate headquarters?
Do the employees have to contribute to a "TOILET PAPER" fund too, when they dare to use the HQ bathroom facilities?
ReplyDeleteMay I suggest a $50 per hour refund on tithe per member who sat through now deleted sermons for no good reason? Most sermons ran 2 hours for weeks so I would think this could be a windfall for members who insist they only pay for honest and true truth that stands the test of "delete".
ReplyDeleteDennis, he has followers because people don't know where else to go.
ReplyDeleteThey need to spend time getting to know themselves and liking themselves without Dave defining their lives for them and pretending his mistaken and cornball ideas are their only safe and acceptable option
DeleteThey always taught us that "the world" didn't sincerely care for us in the ways that "God's Church" did. I'd like us to compare Mr. Pack's attitude and behavior to that of Dr. Armen Sarafian, president of Pasadena City College during the social upheavals of the '60s. That was a time of protests, occupations, and much conflict, for those who don't remember. Spin the tape back to April 1968, and the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Some of the African American students, in a sea of emotions including grief and outrage, occupied the PCC cafeteria, serving themselves lunch in the process. Campus security and some of the administration wanted to call in the police. Dr. Sarafian went to the cafeteria and calmly wrote a check from his own funds for their lunch. People asked why he would do this. Dr. Sarafian calmly stated that these were his students, and he empathized with how they must feel on that day. Imagine what might have happened if the faculty and president of Ambassador College had been in charge at PCC!
ReplyDeleteI knew and regularly spoke with Dr. Sarafian while I was a student at PCC. While I realized that he was Armenian, at that point in my education, I knew nothing of the Armenian holocaust which Hitler had later used as his model for the holocaust which he orchestrated against the Jews. It is possible that Dr. Sarafian's humanity was informed by aspects of the holocaust perpetrated by the Turks upon his people.
Given the obvious choices, would any of us willingly choose to live in a world dominated by Armstrongian thinking? Coffee tax indeed, and even if you don't drink coffee! I wonder if Dave uses the excess for special Starbucks gourmet coffee for pot luck at the feasts?
BB
"Why he even has followers is an enigma to me..."
ReplyDeletemy people are destroyed for lack of knowledge...
Interesting.
ReplyDeleteOf course a comparison between a great educator, survivor and "a wolf in sheepsclothing" does not fly.
I find the remarks interesting in light of the Armenian heritage that was also woven into the wcg fabric. (throught dibar apartian speaking to the french speaking areas and dr kuhn who also sponsored to highlight some aspects of that culture/ the first christians outside of the holy land)
As a matter of fact I had dr kuhn in mind and said a silent prayer when I was on mission in Deir es Zor, visiting the monument dedicated to the end station of the armenian onslought. Of course today this monument lies in ruin, as the location has been visited by the forces of evil again.
Regarding Armstrongian thinking.
I believe that non of the evil current leaders like Packman come close to understanding Armstrongian philosophy.
As a matter of fact. When learning about Sarafians aproach I was rather reminded by the words of the Sri Lankan prime minister who acknowledged WCG/HWA's philosophy by stating his understanding of the words "the more you give the more you will recieve". (this was in the middle of the Tamil war)
It seems this philosophy works in practice as exampled by Sarafian.
"The first money to go into the Martin Luther King scholarship fund came from black students who subsequently apologized to Sarafian and insisted on reimbursing him for their lunches."
I guess that philosophy would work for Pack too if he would just understand what honoring employees is. I am not sure if the Ethiopian eunuch from the bible was a coffee trader though. When confronted by water he chose to be baptized instead of brewing the black broth from his native country. Perhaps it was the Islam people from Moccha who first understood the power of said drink.
nck
Wow, nck. I didn't realize that the anecdote I shared about Dr. Sarfian was public knowledge, but in verifying your quotation, I found it in an article after a short Google search.
DeleteI had learned of that event in my Journalism class the following year at PCC. Dr. Sarafian knew that I had come from that weird cultic and embarrassing college on the other end of town, and therefore took a special interest in my well-being. I had also immediately gotten into the swim of things at PCC by getting on the staff of the Courier, the school newpaper, and sought Dr. Sarafian's opinions for my articles on such things as the campus parking problem. PCC, a community college, was much bigger than AC, yet Dr. Sarafian was much more accessable than any of the faculty at AC. I learned that Armenian people are worthy of tremendous admiration, and later got to do some extensive equipment work for one of the Armenian newspapers in Glendale.
BB
Dave is a spiritual version of Hugh Hefner. Like the late Hugh, Dave lives a luxurious, hedonist lifestyle. Both, like snake oil salesmen, sold a highly flawed product. One sold happiness through adultery, the second, eternal success by buying your way into heaven.
ReplyDeleteAccording to Jeffrey Ambrose, Dave Pack's ultimate puppet, "Mr. Pack sold his "however many square feet" home to live in a considerably modest home built on the campus and pays the rent for that house directly to the Church."
ReplyDeleteIn the words of Dave Pack himself "POPPYCOCK"!!!!
That house built on the campus is brand spanking new...and because he is the "Apostle" hahaha, uses the excuse that it must reflect God and therefore have the best materials and best furniture. You know how many property fees and taxes they will avoid already having owned the land? You know how much they saved on building materials using their 501c3? You know how many members they must have exploited and their time to get the house built in a timely fashion? How about the need for his Vehicle now, that is most likely paid for as a church expense? How about landscaping now? Since its part of the campus and every spring he demands the members volunteer their Sunday time to do landscaping, will he have an excuse now to get his property on the land landscaped at no expense to him, under the guise of it being campus property?
This man is exploiting the church to build himself a tiny paradise, fortified around a campus with plans for a wall-gate, while members are living in low-income housing and in dangerous parts of the world practicing their beliefs knowing that if others discover them they will be killed. Such members as Muslims who converted to Christianity.
I would imagine he even went as far as to put the members at ease by telling them that the house belongs to the Church and uses the story of Mr. Armstrong living on the Campus to justify also living on Campus. And trick the people in believing he is repeating the pattern of HWA. How about the several OTHER HOUSES BUILT FOR HIS PUPPETS? They get Rewarded for essentially having their heads so far up his butt, so long as they continue to agree with him in BUTCHERING DOCTRINE AND DRIVING THE MEMBERSHIP OF A CLIFF, they can live lavishly doing it.
IF THERE IS ANYTHING THAT REPEATING THE GRAND PATTERN OF HWA HAS TAUGHT ME AS A YOUNG 26 YEAR OLD, IT IS THAT IT FAILED AND FAILED BIG. AND THE DEFINITION OF INSANITY IS DOING THE SAME THINGS OVER AND OVER AND EXPECTING A DIFFERENT RESULT.
David C. Pack is the personified form of INSANITY.
Matthew 6:24 .......you cannot serve God and mammon.....
ReplyDeleteGive to
Others
Daily
versus
More
And
More for
Me (DP)
Others
Nothing
Just sayin.....
BB,
ReplyDeleteI should leave the floor to people like 7:42, who are pointing out the insanity and exploitation that is present among some groups.
The 2016 movie "The Promise" is a bit of a weird love story. But it deals with the subject. That movie was sponsored by a great industrialist of armenian descent, regardless whether it should break even. They felt it was a movie that had to be made to tell their story.
When I was a kid I met many a survivor of the death camps and marches from the Asian and European theatres of war. As a matter of fact some of them handed chocolate bars to us kids, every sabbath before services.
To pay respect I have followed many a "death trail". Cemetaries holding up to 17.000 US soldiers. Or this summer accidentally passed by one of the huge monuments holding the bones of a 100.000 victims of WWI.
Just months before the forces of evil entered Mesopotamia, I followed the trail from Aleppo to Deir Zor to pay respect to large part of the Armenian people finding their destination in the desert.
As as kid I remember the horror of our congregation during a presentation celebrating the anniversary of our congregation. Our pastor made some funny remarks aobut the slides highlighting the ugly tie of our local minister At the time I asked my parents about it because I found the tie ugly too and the remarks funny.
Little did I know about the (silent) respect some persons commanded in the congregation because of their hand to hand combat with German special forces and insurgents in other theatres of war. While at the same time being examples of humble, serving, "stewards" of our character.
It would be fitting for any (COG) minister to acquaint themselves with the meaning of the "words" they utter. What the true meaning of words like, peace, death, meekness, humble, suffering, aspiration and the human potential is.
It pains my soul to see people on this blog complaining about "the man child ministers today." Although I do realize that wisdom is not necessarily a factor of age or personal experience. People in position of authority should at least acquaint themselves with the fulness of what they are speaking about. And I do realize that the phrase "the big picture" is tainted also but it is an important paradigm.
I guess Pastor Boyne was exemplary in his desire to learn from others. In a way he was pastoring to us "crack addicts". We are not seeking help. And he was not seeking gain. And all benefitted in some way if one was open to it, or even in ranting against a position he would not compromise on. Yeah. people should be catalysts to discover the better in themselves. Hey but as MLK said. I have a dream.
nck
Right on, nck! When I was in fifth grade, we had sessions in which the class members would bring in unusual items from home. One shocking item was brought in by a very good friend of mine, whose father, in hand to hand combat, had stabbed a Nazi soldier to death during WW II. The item he brought to class was the Nazi's wrist watch. It was of particular significance to me because of all of the HWAcaca we were taught about the Germans, who in reality would have needed to get a race change operation to ever be Assyrian.
DeleteWords indeed have meaning, and sadly, this fact is even today lost on all of those who still indulge in the Orwellian doublespeak and twisted meanings inherent in all of the Armstrong shibboleths.
Pastor Boyne indeed ministered to us through his friendship and example in ways that nobody else in the ACOGs was evolved or developed enough to do. Back in the 1960s, Ellis LaRavia could come close to similar feats, and one would hope that it is something he never lost. But, it is sad that the few people who might actually rehabillitate the movement and take it in a Christlike direction are taken out, while the spiritual predators end up vaingloriously thriving personally as they inflict great damage on the sheep. That, to me, is God's most eloquent testimony with regard to Armstrongism. Could it be that it is beyond reforming, and that He simply wants it gone? When we see the best and brightest taken out, that seems to be the most logical conclusion.
BB
Wow,
ReplyDeleteYou reckon God is an investment banker on a "cut loss" spree?
I know he speaks about pruning.
Transitioning can be ruthless indeed.
Interesting how physical items can bring closure.
For me personally I was present at the shooting of "A single man" at the AC Pasadena Campus.
I could deal with all the empty buildings as I have related my archeological exploits.
Just to witness the expression in art of "homosexual mental agony" in the offices of HWA and Stanley Rader (as symbol of power), for me brought complete peace of mind and closure as to the acceptance of the demise of the physical remainder of Armstrongism.
I never thought much about the idea of closure. From the Noah example God seems to close with the symbol of "Rainbows".
Thinking of it I do know God is an investment banker. Jamie Dimmon said so. And they can both make the desert bloom like a rose. I have seen it happen.
nck
Forget the coffee, this is one place where you don't want to drink the juice!
ReplyDeleteHey everybpod Start bringing Thermos bottles full of your own coffee,and dare that Puny Pack to take them from you!
ReplyDelete