The Stone Cries Out..."I'm erratic!"
The story of this rock begins and ends in one paragraph in Herbert Armstrong's autobiography2 where he tells the story of how he was a guest at the farm home of Mr. and Mrs. Elmer E. Fischer and while exercising on the hilltop he discovered a rock "about 14 inches high," where he prayed for the success of the new campaign meeting west of Eugene, Oregon. This rock was evidently the right height for him to kneel beside and so HWA said it became his "prayer rock." He goes on to say that he is sure that he "drank in much energy, spiritual strength and inspiration at that prayer rock."
(It was also a lot history that would contradict his beliefs)
Jesus Delivers His Throne To the Willamette Valley (13,000 BCE) and PCG
Gerald's Throne for Jesus Arrives in Portland and is ice rafted down to Eugene.
1000 Ft high surge roars down the Columbia River Basin at Crown Point just outside Portland 15,000 years ago after 2000 ft High ice dam bursts in Montana. The flood created the Scablands of Eastern Washington State and flowed to 200 feet deep at Eugene, Oregon
Crown Point on the Columbia today. The huge rock in the upper left corner is Beacon Rock and is the core of an extinct volcano left after the flood washed the cinder cone clean away leaving the basalt plug.
Jesus's PCG Throne appears to actually be an "erratic" commonly found in the Willamette Valley from Portland to Eugene. The rock appears to be typical granite which is not a type of rock found in the area. Thus it is called an erratic. Granite such as commonly found on farms in the Willamette Valley originally comes from Idaho or Montana and these erratics are called "ice rafted" as they could only have gotten here by melting out of ice.
The Eugene Erratic?
Eastern Washington State erratic
The Missoula Floods (also known as the Spokane Floods or the Bretz Floods) refer to the cataclysmicf loods that swept periodically across eastern Washington and down the Columbia River Gorge at the end of the last ice age. The glacial flood events have been researched since the 1920s. These glacial lake outburst floods were the result of periodic sudden ruptures of the ice dam on the Clark Fork River that created Glacial Lake Missoula. After each ice dam rupture, the waters of the lake would rush down the Clark Fork and the Columbia River, flooding much of eastern Washington and the Willamette Valley in western Oregon. After the rupture, the ice would reform, creating Glacial Lake Missoula again.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missoula_Floods
The Flood even ice rafted one of the largest meteorites in America, down from Montana and melted it out in West Linn, Oregon , 8 miles south of Portland, where it was found in a farmers field.
"Known as "Tomanowos" to the Clackamas, who lived in the Willamette Valley before the arrival of European settlers, the Meteorite is revered by the Clackamas and their descendants. According to the tradition of the Clackamas, Tomanowos has healed and empowered people in the Willamette Valley since the beginning of time. The Clackamas believe that Tomanowos came to the valley as a representative of the Sky People and that a union occurred between the sky, earth, and water when it rested in the ground and collected rainwater in its basins. The rainwater served as a powerful purifying, cleansing, and healing source for the Clackamas and their neighbors. Tribal hunters, seeking power, dipped their arrowheads in the water collected in the Meteorite's crevices. These traditions and the spiritual link with Tomanowos are preserved today through the ceremonies and songs of the descendants of the Clackamas. Beginning in the 1850s, the Clackamas, along with more than 20 other tribes and bands from western Oregon and northern California, were relocated to the Grand Ronde Reservation in Oregon. Today, the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde, a federally recognized tribe, is the successor to the Clackamas Tribe."
You don't find 16 tons of iron that hit earth at 40.000 mph back in the day lying in the dirt of a cleared farmer's field.
So....the Sacred Stone of Blasphemy is most likely also an ice rafted and deposited erratic from Montana compliments of the Missoula Flood.
The Prayer Rock on the way to Eugene, Oregon
The very rock that HWA prayed before and that Gerald Flurry now declares to be where his Jesus will return to is actually contains in it's actual history the proof that the tales woven by HWA and Flurry (Dave Pack as well) about a 6000 year plan of God and a recent creation is somewhat mistaken to say the least. .
Not only were/are the teachings of HWA and now Gerald Flurry erratic at best, but both men prayed before one and were granted their erratic theology.
The funniest part in all of this is that old-timers in the area know that Gerald got the WRONG rock! It's not clear how the misunderstanding occurred, whether it was a sincere but misinformed PCG member sharing bad information, or whether it was some ambitious glad-hander knowingly lying in order to impress Flurry. But it is still known among old-timer COG7 members in the region today that Herbert's prayer rock is still in place where it always was.
ReplyDeleteOne late afternoon on the Pasadena campus, after work, a group of us were making carne asada, smoking cigars, and drinking some beer when the story of Flurry popped up about him digging up Herbert's so-called prayer rock. A certain well-placed church administrator who was chewing the fat with us that day said that Flurry did not have the actual rock Herbert supposedly prayed at. They knew where it was and that Flurry did not have it.
ReplyDeleteNo one should believe anything that comes out of either of the Flurry's or the PCG as truth.
That tells me how bat shit crazy the COG’s are.. Worshiping a STONE? A relic? Considering it HOLY?
ReplyDeleteWhat the heck happened to the commandments? What about “I am the LORD thy God.” And “No other gods before me.” And what about “No graven images”?
And meanwhile all these narcissistic COG leaders tell the members that they’ll end up in the lake of fire if they LEAVE?
I would say God would APPLAUD them for leaving!
I don't remember ever wanting a Prayer Rock, but in my early WCG days I wanted a Prayer Bench. HWA wrote that he had a prayer bench at his home in Eugene around the time of his "intensive study" or when plagiarizing Judah's sceptre and Joseph's birthright.
ReplyDeleteI think this is a lie. When looking at Herbert's physique from old photos and what I remember from seeing him in person back in the 1970's, I doubt he EVER exercised unless he was going to the bar to get another bottle of Harvey's or making entries in his flog log.
ReplyDeleteFHWA--Fat Herbert W Armstrong
DeleteHerbert Armstrong used to do alot of walking in the 30's and 40's. So I would suggest he did have bouts of regular exercise.
DeleteI have seen the steep massive hill Herbert used to climb going to COG7 Sabbath services.
Prayer rock? Doesn't this sound like the Catholics with their statues and such? And the ACOGs campuses being little Jerusalems that Christ will return to.
ReplyDeleteFlurry is smoking rock
ReplyDeleteWhat do the JMAC stand for ?
DeleteWhere is the prayer rock? Where is the Ark of the Covenant. Big mysteries. Where's Indiana Jones? Maybe the Pope has it at the Vatican along with the chair of Peter. Just another idea to distract them from taking care of those in need.
ReplyDeleteThanks for reposting, Dennis!
ReplyDeleteOne of my favorites.
A counterpoint: Christianity has venerated relics (of saints) and employed artifacts from the earliest times. The Second Council of Nicaea in 787 stated the following about relics:
ReplyDelete". . . that homage or respect is not really paid to an inanimate object, but to the holy person, and indeed the veneration of a holy person is itself honor paid to God." (Wikipedia)
HWA's prayer stone would not be a relic, I think, but rather an artifact. But artifacts tend to be tools of some sort or some kind of liturgical art. All denominations that I know of have artifacts associated with worship. One of the most common is the collection plate. So I am not sure how HWA's prayer stone, with its impressive geological etiology, would be regarded by the Second Council as to category. That is, something that is purportedly the throne of Christ would be very much more than a mere artifact. But I am not sure what. A divine object resident on earth? This would defy the usual categories and would have to be exhaustively credentialed by the Christian Church as a whole. Otherwise, anyone could assert anything about any object. My favorite coffee cup could become holy.
In my view the crucial issue is how the artifact is embedded in theology. Or what kind of dogma it evinces. Is it a physical correlate to some un-Biblical view? Or does it promote orthodoxy? You shall know the artifact, as you know the tree, by its fruit.
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ReplyDeleteI reckon the prayer rock is GF’s wannabe of the coronation stone. And there have been mini replicas of the coronation chair and stone for sale as novelty items since the 1930s. I have one myself from the Westminster shop. The first time I saw one actually was in a BIWF library a few decades ago lol.
They've literally turned Mr. Armstrong into an idol and worship him.
ReplyDelete