Gerald Flurry makes the following comment in his latest booklet. This is pretty rich coming from a guy that controls every aspect of his follower's lives to the point they will abandon families just because he said so. The Church of God has always been about legislating what its members thought with hundreds of booklets, letters, magazines and books on every topic imaginable.
When has any member in the church ever been able to make their own decisions and formulate their own thoughts without the church interfering in one manner or another? Anytime a church member does that the ministry brings the hammer down.David could command huge choirs of people, and he commanded praising and thanking God. That is straightforward instruction. But you cannot legislate the way people think. This is where character comes in. Each individual must make his own decisions and master his own thoughts.
It is pretty much the same with most of the COG groups. They will talk about not being able to legislate the way people think but they legislate people like crazy. Some of the groups are more subtle about it but it is largely the same across the board.
ReplyDeleteJeremy
Gerald says: "Each individual must make his own decisions and master his own thoughts."
ReplyDeleteAside to the inner circle: "Which of course should compliantly match our own decisions and thoughts....so there be no division amongst us and all that"
As we use to hear from the pulpit, God gives us freedom, "the freedom to obey or disobey." Golly, doesn't the military give their soldiers heaps of freedom.
ReplyDeleteObviously there are only snapshots in time, and no true originality, since everything the COgs ever came up with was borrowed or plagiarized from other extremists.
ReplyDeleteBut, flashing back to the ‘60s for one of those snapshots, GTA used to proclaim that “You can’t legislate character.” That is an actual truth. You can legislate compliance and punish noncompliance, but character is defined by what you say, think, and do by your natural self either when nobody is watching you, when you don’t think you will get caught, or when you know that the existing authority structure will cover your bad deeds.
You can teach people more ethical paradigms, which, when embraced and lived by, will guide the way they think. The Armstrong movement has always dictated and enforced paradigms, (Ahem! With double standards!) and has a history of punishing or disfellowshipping those who do not comply. They’ve also either redefined and obscured this or are confused about what it really means for them internally within their organization.
BB
I wonder how many splinter groups have ever changed any of their teachings based on a members idea or suggestion? And I'm not talking about major doctrines. Any examples?
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