AICF Putting Tithe Money To Work

I bet most  COG members did not know that their tithes and offerings went to help finance two movies in the early to mid 70's.  Paper Moon and The Wild Geese.  This was all thanks to AICF, the 'cultural' arm of the Worldwide Church of God.

Because Herbert Armstrong was embarrassed to say 'God' in foreign countries he created this money eating arm of the church to use as a tool to enter countries around the world.  Then he would talk about "A Strong Hand From Someplace."  WHAT??????  God forbid if he ever said Jesus!

Storyline

Adapted from the novel, "Addie Pray" (1971) by Joe David Brown, PAPER MOON is the story of Moses Pray and Addie Loggins. With scenery reminiscent of "The Grapes of Wrath," the film is set in the depression-era Midwestern region of the United States. As the movie opens, we see a small group of mourners clustered at a graveside. Among the mourners is Addie, the dead woman's small daughter. Moses Pray -- ostensibly of the "Kansas Bible Company" -- approaches the group, as the service concludes, and two of the elderly women remark that the child bears some resemblance to him and asks if he might be related. "If ever a child needed kin, it's now," one lady says. With no knowledge of who her father is, Addie's only haven is her Aunt's home in St. Joseph, Missouri. Having identified himself as a "traveling man spreading the Lord's gospel in these troubled times," "Mose" is prevailed upon to deliver the helpless child to her Aunt since he's going that way... Written by MARK FLEETWOOD <mfleetwo@mail.coin.missouri.edu>  

The Wild Geese (1978)

A British multinational seeks to overthrow a vicious dictator in central Africa. It hires a band of (largely aged) mercenaries in London and sends them in to save the virtuous but imprisoned opposition leader who is also critically ill and due for execution. Just when the team has performed a perfect rescue, the multinational does a deal with the vicious dictator leaving the mercenary band to escape under their own steam and exact revenge. Written by Richard Young <richy@vnu.co.uk>

The veteran mercenary Colonel Allen Faulkner travels to London invited by the British millionaire Sir Edward Matherson to rescue the African President Julius Limbani that had been abducted in a coup d'état by the dictator Colonel Mboya. Sir Edward has interest in the copper mines and intends to negotiate with Limbani. Col. Faulkner hires his friends Captain Rafer Janders and Lieutenant Shawn Fynn and the trio select their old friends to form the rescue team. They plan the whole operation and succeed in their mission; however, Sir Edward deals with the dictator and double-crosses the group of mercenaries, leaving them in Rhodesia. The mercenaries have to fight against Colonel Mboya's troops to survive and Col. Faulkner promises to revenge his deceased friends. Written by Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Churchill's Gold: GTA's Other Book

Garner Ted Armstrong loved to write. But there is one book that most COG members never knew about that he penned under a pseudonym: William Talboy Wright.

William Talboy Wright was a mixture of names from his grandparents.  Willam Dillon (maternal grandfather), Isabelle Talboy (maternal grandmother), and Eva Wright (paternal grandmother).

Wright, William Talboy
     Churchill's Gold, 1988 (With nothing to lose, falsely accused fugitive
       Mark Masters agrees to take a wooden barkentine to the South Seas on a
       search for sunken treasure to bail out the British treasury during WW
       II.  "I found it to be an exciting adventure story of sailing despite
       the author having made some rather strange historical mistakes (e.g. he
       thought Taiwan was under Chinese control in 1941!) and totally out of
       his mind with regard to Spanish archives (the book inspired me to write
       my own book on how to find shipwrecks in Hispanic archives)." [LF])

He also penned The Real Jesus before he got kicked out of WCG.  He published another book a few years later called Peter's Story.