A Ministry of Arrogance
They tend to rise to the top on the backs of the genuine "Helpers of their Joy"
In 26 years of ministry, I had encountered many personalities in ministry. Most I knew were very sincere in WCG, of no particular reputation in ways that hurt the people who they served. This includes pastors of an number of denominations I befriended along the way as well as in WCG. The pastors I met outside WCG and became friend with were much more educated in ministry, well loved and appreciated and wouldn't last ten minutes in their congregations if they were otherwise. Congregants had a say in their future thus putting a check on the crazies, like some we see today in the splinters today who have no such scrutiny. Their members can like it or lump in terms of their options.
The classic issue of "Church Government" in WCG and now too in most of the splinters of it, is ultimately their undoing.
Apostle Dave Pack, Gerald Flurry and Ron Weinland being our best examples of this phenomenon.
However, there were also "the difficult ones" WCG allowed any number of them flourish where any other company would have sent them packing long ago. The concept of just moving these types around after their antics and arrogance disheartened their current congregation almost beyond repair , to do it all again always puzzled me personally. It was just as difficult for the sincere pastors to be around them as for the congregations they tormented.
And no, there was never instruction at AC on how to be arrogant, controlling and "in charge". Never. These kids matured into the destructive personalities when they were on their own. I once suggested to the HQ Administration of the time that all perspective pastors and even current ones be given a genuinely professional personality profile. The reaction was telling and of course it never happened.
This guy reminded me of some of them...
And just for fun...
Best Feast EVER!
16 comments:
Problems occur when people believe that the answers to life come from outside , rather than from within.
Most Christians believe that the power is from the Spirit of God, and faith in God and Jesus Christ. However, this is a tough one for most people, and requires a still , quiet , journey, that takes many years or trial, patience, meditation, and self examination. A "discipline" if you will.
It is much easier, faster and less accountable, to just delegate the process to an outsider "Guru/Shaman" to do all that thinking and self management for you! Thus the "business" and profitability of being a Guru or Icon, like Pack, Flurry, Weinland , Thiel et al. Same goes for politicians, movie stars, ball players and more.
Live your own life, and quit living vicariously through all of these sociopaths on all levels and venues.
Ron Dart used to remark about AC, when he was Chancellor of Big Sandy, that the problem students at AC became problem Ministers later on.
The makers of our agony.
The basic problem is that most people are airheads. They are drenched in lies from Hollywood and the fake media day and night. The news is fake, and so history is fake, and so fulfilled prophecy is fake. These dope-head ministers have a fake idea of leadership and manliness. So they push people around and exceed their authority like some drill sergeant tough-guy they saw in a zombie-head movie. They are too narrow-minded to research all sides of an issue so they continue to think the bible is not junk.
Vote in your minister and you get a people pleaser. Democracy elevates the stupid but it subjugates the intelligent who have the wisdom to see beyond what the masses of fools can see.
Dennis, you wrote "And no, there was never instruction at AC on how to be arrogant, controlling and "in charge". Never."
I find it interesting that you would hold this view but not surprising. I believe the people who went through the AC mill are unable to retain perspective and your statement supports that. I witnessed the dynamics of AC/BS from the viewpoint of an outsider. And my view is much different.
AC students were immersed every day of their lives in anodizing fluids of hubris. If some escaped, it was a miracle. This was not organized coursework but the daily experience of living in the AC milieu. The AC system was based on strict hierarchy - the AC pecking order. And privileges were rationed based on ones status in the hierarchy. Since this misbegotten praxis was energized by Armstrongist theology, it took on a kind of religious profundity.
In my view, this was the real education at Ambassador College. It was not the coursework but the environment. Students learned the hierarchy. If they were sharp, they learned how to ascend the hierarchy to ever larger perks. They learned who was important and who was not. They learned to position themselves to advantage. They learned that it was important to work in the Business office and not on the Gardening Crew. I cannot possibly list the points of "AC wisdom" but let me say that there was a whole syllabus of behavior shaping learning experiences to be had at AC without ever entering a classroom. A few felt oppressed by this system and many others found their natural calling. And the beahaviors migrated out into local congregations.
Anonymous (9:35) wrote "Ron Dart used to remark about AC . . . that the problem students at AC became problem Ministers later on."
That is not quite the truth. It seems to say that there was a group of students who were problematical but everyone else was fine. And this may seem true when viewed from the perspective that the baseline AC education was good. And some students regrettably just did not "get it." Dart is wrong about this. The baseline education was concerned with a system of hierarchy and competition and some students became worse than others under this informal schooling but they had all been immersed. Some, shall we say, exceeded baseline.
The pragmatic outcome is what many of us have experienced in years of sitting in the pews of Armstrongist organizations. I have seldom encountered an AC trained person, male or female, on the payroll or off, who was not dismissive of local church members, for instance. This disdain is palpable. Sometimes local church members will deceive themselves that this is leadership ability manifesting. But it is simple, cynical ego-centrism brewed in the juices of hierarchy.
My two cents . . .
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Dennis: A Ministry of Arrogance
I went to AC just a few years ahead of Dennis and I left the ministry just a few years before Dennis left. I agree with Dennis on how arrogant ministers were handled.
Another HUGH problem confronting a minister was we had no training on how to minister. As a young graduate, newly married, how much did I know about child rearing? How much did I know about medical issues, marital counseling, finances, alcoholism, mental problems and a thousand other issues. I knew nothing.
Dennis has written about these issues many times. All I knew from AC was to parrot what I had been told or had read in our own publications.
I have learned more about theology since leaving WCG than I ever learned as a student or minister.
I applaud Dennis for standing up and telling it as he sees it. Dennis knows more about the Bible than any minister I ever knew in WCG.
Jim-AZ
AC was pretty much a rework of Dale Carnegie philosophy, and not very spiritual. The typical minister was one who was fairly good looking and tall and did well in speech class, and also had a take charge attitude. Then these same students who were admittedly promising young men were told to select a bride from the group of AC co-eds. Generally the highest rank men chose the highest rank and best looking women. Good enough but with the strict rules around dating many of these people didn't know each other that well, but to be a minister it was important to have a wife.
Many of these couples were thrown together on some matchmaker ministers advice, then if things worked out stayed together for the next 50 years. There was no exposure to outside influences, I am sure some must have dilly dallied and tried a few alternatives. Surely it is mighty unusual to only have sex with one person your whole life. I bet many couldn't help but wonder if, if, if (not to mention those that might have been happier with a different sex). So there was no outside influence on these superior people chosen by god, pretty stressful I imagine. Then the whole thing fell apart. After many of the leaders were thrown out or left, the the church had to go to the second level to get ministers - the local deacon even had a chance, ok I'm getting tired even thinking about it.
Anon 535
Painfully well said and accurate
Church Government was a terribly destructive policy. I am in my 50's and still learning to cope with some of the bad habits I accumulated from growing up in Worldwide. I always felt inferior to my schoolmates and I found it difficult to make friends in Worldwide. I was used to going to church at the local Southern Baptist congregation and suddenly my dad forced me to attend in Birmingham at an old American Legion Hall with often 2+ hour services. I remember feeling traumatized and confused. There was no place for young children and it just plain stank. I am not mad at my now deceased father but I don't think he ever realized how it shook up our world.
The good,the bad,and the ugly.
Spaghetti western. And a good disscription of the ministry.
Spaghetti ministry.
My own personal experience was how fortunate I was to meet some genuine men in the ministry.
SOME. That was perhaps the experience of many of us sheepie.
12.38 PM
You seem to be advocating tyranny. It's the biggest false god in human history. As they say, name one successful society based on tyranny. Just where do your "intelligent" leaders come from that rule over the "masses of fools"? Do they drop down like manna from heaven? No, rather they are chosen from the masses of fools. As many economists have pointed out, the masses of fools possess most of the knowledge in a country. The leaders only possess a few percentage points of the total national knowledge. This is observable in the comments section of YouTube videos where the comments often have superior information than the video itself. I would rather have a pleaser minister than a bastard Herb minister.
Anon 4:31. The is no 12:38 comment.
I meant 12.28 PM rather than 12.38.
"I would rather have a pleaser minister than a bastard Herb minister."
Both are options for the hopeless who don't see a third or fourth way.
If economists are so smart about how the people are so smart why does the average idiot voter seem unwilling or unable to reign in the government debt? There are "tyrants" (as you put it) who have done far better for their people and built societies with less crime and happier people even in an age of far less technology. Some of these "tyrants" were loved by all. The leaders of democracies are hated by most of their own people. They only get voted in because the alternatives are hated even more.
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