I’ve watched professional wrestling for as long I can remember. Yeah, it’s fake, but it’s still fun.
The older I got, the more I understood what wrestling was all about. I learned that, in professional wrestling, there’s this thing called Kayfabe. Kayfabe has a fascinating history that goes back to the county fair carnival days of the 1800s.
Wrestling Kayfabe started around the 1920s. Wrestling Kayfabe began as the secret code of silence between the wrestlers and the referees. And these guys made a vow to never reveal the secrets of wrestling’s not being legitimate sport.
Today, wrestling Kayfabe has all changed. Starting around 1986, the wrestling alliances admitted that their matches are NOT genuine sporting competitions. Today, they acknowledge that professional wrestling is all staged. Pre-determined. Entertainment and not sport.
Right now, Kayfabe is an agreement between the audience and the wrestlers -- where both the wrestlers and the audience all acknowledge that it’s fake. And they all agree to pretend that it’s real.
Now, why would both the performers and the audience come to this agreement? I mean, in any agreement, you always ask, “What does everybody get out of the arrangement?”
First, the wrestlers get paid.
Second, the guy who owns the wrestling organization makes profit.
And what about number three? What does the audience get? Well, the audience gets to be entertained.
When a person pays money to watch a wrestling match, it’s a catharsis for that person. It’s similar to when you go see a movie.
When you go see a motion picture, you suspend disbelief. Yes, while you’re sitting in the theater eating your popcorn, you’re suspending your disbelief and simply enjoying yourself.
This exact same thing goes on in professional wrestling. People are willing to spend money so they can sit there, suspend their disbelief, and enjoy the show.
That’s the entertainment world. Movies and wrestling. Now, let’s talk about the religious world.
The Sabbath-keeping COGs have a similar relationship with their audience. We call their audience the membership. And everybody involved in this arrangement gets something out of it.
First, the ministers get paid.
Second, the organizations take in money.
And third, the brethren suspend disbelief by pretending that their church is really doing the work of God. That’s what the brethren get out of this relationship. The pretense that their church is preaching the Gospel and feeding the flock.
I know this statement is offensive to some but, just like the wrestling fan who suspends disbelief as he sees these performers smashing each other with fake punches, members of the COGs suspend disbelief as they hear their leaders talk about how they’re preaching the Gospel.
And I say that they’re suspending disbelief because they’re NOT preaching the Gospel. Too many times, they’re only accomplishment is sheep stealing.
The most recent example of this is the UCG/COGWA Reno NV sheep-stealing debacle. (See the February 9, 2020 “Banned...” article on the subject.)
Since the 1970s (starting with the Ambassador Review), people have been calling for reform in the Armstrong COGs. If reform is really going to happen, the first step has to be the removal of all the doctrines that HWA added to the teachings he learned from CG7. HWA added crap doctrines like headline theology, setting dates, racism, three-tithe system, church eras, end-time apostleship, top-down government, one-true church, marking/disfellowshipping, anti-science, etc.
As long as current COGs refuse to reject Armstrongism from their belief systems, they are stuck with a Kayfabe Religion. It’s all fake.
(Wes White may be reached at: wdwhite49@yahoo.com.)
