Breaking in the new year, The Two Witnesses podcast presents: Episode #3 "Walk This Way"

 

Breaking in the new year, The Two Witnesses podcast presents: Episode #3 "Walk This Way"

Two Witnesses Podcast: Walk This Way

If there was anything the Worldwide Church of God was really good at (besides collecting member tithes), it was telling members that they'd better Walk and Talk as the leader Herbert Armstrong and the ministry taught (but notably did not necessarily do themselves). In the specific case of the WCG, and in many of the splinters, members knew and know that they'd better toe the party line or they are to be expunged from the organization and most likely disfellowshipped, which means being estranged from their friends and acquaintances in the church.

This is one of the identifying features of any cult, and in this episode, the Two Witness hosts go through several characteristics that define a "cult", discussing how their own experiences demonstrate these characteristics being manifested in the WCG and its daughter churches. Certainly, many readers here will be able to relate to it.

In this episode, you'll also hear:

HWA railing against any sinful Jezebel-like women who would dare to put on makeup!

Rod Meredith screaming like a madman against what was apparently his favorite subject, sex and the "homosexual queers"!

HWA's obsession with his own importance, and his lackeys and worshippers who even now still lap it up.

Members being put in fear of not being able to escape to the "place of safety" in Petra when HWA gave the word.

Garner Ted Armstrong scaring baptized members by explaining that leaving the church is... the Unpardonable Sin!

At one point Witness Ralph tries to declare himself the new Apostle, but we're having none of that! :)

There's also a shout-out to John Trechak (RIP) that some may know from the once-published Ambassador Report, and another to this very blog, BannedByHWA.

With one more episode being planned after this one, this is the penultimate.  We hope interested listeners will find it worth their time, or at least fodder for further recollection or discussion.

Michael

Talk About Some Busy Angels!

click to embiggen

Armstrongism has always thrived on the myth that it's members were going to be whisked away to three an half years of final training in the deserts of Jordan. 

Various evangelists and ministers have come up with all kids of idiotic ways of getting there.  The big thing that was floating around when 1971 hit the scene was that DC 9's (or 10's) would be used to get us there.  At that point in time those planes were having a lot of problems with cracks in their wings.  Some numbnut in Pasadena came up with the reasoning that with all the airliners disposing of those planes we would be able to use them to fly the church to Petra.  God was going to miraculously hold those wings together and not allow them to fall apart mid flight over the Atlantic.  The airline companies would be happy to give us the planes because they all secretly hoped the planes would crash and the TRUE CHURCH would be killed off.  But to our relief and comfort our magical god was going to make it all work out to our benefit.

Now there is some minister telling his congregations that personal angles will be whisking members off to Petra when the time arrives.  I forget where I heard that first.  It may have been in a comment on here.

Tonight there was a comment on the the uber-conservative COG board on Yahoo.  They brought up this very point:

  In Mathew 24 and starting in verse 15, it tells about the coming tribulation and going down through verse 44, do these events follow in exact sequence, and immediately happen just prior to Christ`s return, or could some of these events happen just prior to the tribulation? Who would it be that would be the one taken and the one left? It would seem that since God`s people will be in a place of safety at the time of the tribulation, where would the one be taken to be apparently spared?! Is it possible that in verse 40 and verse 41 that it is referring to those just prior to the tribulation, and is it possible that these verses are speaking about some in the Church where one is converted and the other is not and the converted one taken to a place of safety, possibly by an angel of God?-----I just thought that I would throw this out as food for thought.

You would think after 70 some years of failed prophecies and the public abysmal failure in 1971 and 1975 that these numbnuts would keep their mouths shut!  But no!  It is one speculation after another. 

  Flurry's cult is ready to flee at any moment as they build million dollar buildings around the clock.  Meredith's cult is ready to flee in 2012 or 2016 or whenever Prophet Theil figures out the correct date.

What would Armstrongism be without it's myths, legends and it's magical god?

The Human Face of Harold Camping's Cult

The look like a normal family.  A mother and father with beautiful looking children.  The also appear to have some intelligence and education.  Reading a few blurbs about them in the Daily Mail (London) you see a mother and father who believe so deeply in Camping's nonsense that they have the ability to tell their children that they are going to be left behind to suffer through the apocalypse while they (mommy and daddy) are whisked off to heaven for eternal bliss.

One U.S. family in particular will be stunned that the Rapture failed to happen.

Two years ago Robert Carson and Abby Haddad gave up their jobs to preach for the Family Radio church at the centre of the May 21 Judgment Day campaign.

They even told their three children - Joseph, Faith and Grace - that they were going to die.

Speaking to the New York Times, 16-year-old Grace Haddad said: 'My mom has told me directly that I’m not going to get into heaven. At first it was really upsetting, but it’s what she honestly believes.'

Another dedicated follower is Michael Garcia.

After spending months travelling the country to put up Judgment Day billboards and hand out Bible tracts, he planned to spend Friday evening with his family at home in Alameda, near the Christian media empire's Oakland headquarters.

'We know the end will begin in New Zealand and will follow the sun and roll on from there,' said Garcia, a 39-year-old father of six. 'That's why God raised up all the technology and the satellites so everyone can see it happen at the same time.'

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1389481/Rapture-The-world-DIDNT-end-6pm.html#ixzz1N5Y9uQm2

Their beliefs are exactly like the silliness that permeates Armstrongism to this day.  Armstrongism still looks at the idea of fleeing to Petra for a final training to be god's and goddesses.  Parents of unbaptized children will be made god's while their kids will be left in Petra to continue to live as mortal human beings.  Unless of course, they have not been killed by the invading armies that hate the true church so much that they nuke the place.  Oh wait, the stupid pagan's can't even do that!  Petra will be covered by a cloud that makes it invisible to airplanes.  That cloud will scramble the radar of planes so no one will ever be able to find Petra.  Sound stupid?  You bet!  That was actual teachings of Armstrongite ministers!

Even the callousness of the parents telling their kids they will not make it is exactly in line with Armstrongism.  We proclaimed the same thing.  Your child's only chance was to have had a prayer said of him/her at the Blessing of the Children service.  If that happened then they at least had a chance!  Otherwise they were doomed.  And, god forbid if you child did not get baptized by 18.  They were immediately destined to the lake of fire.

One WCG minister who left during all the changes wrote a book about his journey out of Armstrongism and into Lutheranism, Misery Synod.  He also made the same claims about his kids.  Because they had not converted to Lutheranism, Misery Synod, they were not going to make it into heaven. Eternally damned, lost, beyond redemption.

What a sad, impotent little god that would cause parents to make such comments to their kids!

The Place of Safety vs The Rapture

Armstrongism has always loved to mock the 'Rapture' belief of some Christians. But, when you look at the sheer stupidity that Armstrongism prompts as 'fleeing to Petra/Place of Safety' our beliefs are just as crazy.

Of course our version will have our God gather our members up on tired, worn out airplanes after our governments expel us from our respective countries. We will fly these worn out planes (held aloft by angels) to some God forsaken desert in Jordan where Muslims will greet us with open arms. Then the tired and homeless brethren will file in through the narrow gate into the glories of Petra while the leadership will be housed in the Marriott and Crown Plaza located outside the entrance to Petra.

Those lucky to make it inside will not have food, water, toilet's, blanket's etc. The Muslims will be giving that all to us because we are the True Christians.

A cloud of God will hover over Petra so that NATO bombers and the Anti-Christ's armies cannot kill us all.

We will spend three and half years having sing-a-long's in the amphitheater.

We will get to hear Meredith and Flurry preach to us day in and day out.

Health issues will disappear, cavities will be filled, contacts and eye glasses will not be needed because God is either going to cure us or we will be so glad to be 'saved' from the tribulation that we will not care.

Here's where the Church leaders will stay:

And here is where you will be staying:

So who's crazier?