UCG: When Is A "Christian" Pastor Not A Christian Pastor?

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Screen shot of current speaker of the Why Were You Born campaign

UCG has started another round of public campaigns designed to bring in the uneducated masses of "so-called" Christians who are disillusioned with their own churches or beliefs.  Typical of all the other Church of God's UCG is using another recycled catch phrase that the Mother Church (WCG) used decades ago.  Apparently in the 21st century new ideas cannot be dreamed up.

What I found interesting about the advertising for this event is that the UCG has to DOUBLY stress that Gary Petty is a "Christian."    The description of Petty starts out with, "A long-time pastor and Christian speaker...ordained into the ministry of Jesus Christ..."  Ok, if I was a non COGite then this means the guy is a Christian and think nothing more about it.  Then UCG has to reenforce again that Petty served "...Christian congregations..."  If you are a Christian minister then who else would you be serving for?  Is he the minister of The First Universal Fellowship of Atheists or what? Apparently UCG still cannot get over the fact that they are considered a cult in the Cincinnati area and around the world.  A cult that still follows Herbert Armstrong to the point of deifying him and his teachings.It's soon to be 2015.  Come up with an ORIGINAL thought and make it your own.  Stop falling back on Hebert's legacy.

Oh, and Petty is a world famous author now of a book selling on Amazon, In Plato’s Shadow – The Hellenizing of Christianity.  Reading the reviews is nothing but a slobberfest of UCG members praising the book as the most enlightening thing they have ever read.

UCG Advertising Campaign Leads To Online Hilarity As UCG Censors Comments

UPDATE:  In a typical knee jerk fashion UCG put a stop to anyone criticizing their expensive advertising campaign and deleted any comment daring to criticize them.  Now they will pull the other COG stunt and fill the hall up in September with loads of UCG members to make it look like the public has swarmed in because they are soooooooooooooooooo interested in finding out why they were born.  I cant wait to see the glowing reports on the untold hundreds who came to hear the truth once delivered and somehow lost by an incredibly incompetent god who did not have the power to defend believers through the centuries till HWA hit the scene.

Victor Kubik has a screenshot on his Facebook page today with a billboard of UCG's new advertising strategy.  As usual the faithful are on slobbering all over the campaign as totally AWESOME!

However.....they have some great zingers on there from nonUCG folk that show how silly this campaign is.  Some of the comments are:

Your existence was the outcome of some very unlikely events if we considered all the the sperms of your ancestors that did not succeed but could have. That should not lead you to think that your existence was so important that God must have guided each sperm!

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Why was I born? Because my parents did not believe in abortion. Yep, that's what they told me...lol

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My Parents had sex, just like all of your parents had sex.

now that you've thought of it a moment...lets ask the big question. Why are we alive?

I have a theory, at least for me. I was destined to grow up in a religion founded by a failed advertiser who's theology caused the death of a parent, allowed me to contract all sorts of fun diseases and spend the first half of my life in sheer misery, and fear, all because my parents followed a pedophilic charlatan , that I was too terrified of God to question when I grew up so lived another 23 years in poverty and abuse. It still astounds me that people esteem this person, may his corpse always be slug bait.

i lived in hell, so I can appreciate freedom, and joy, and peace. Freedom from religious oppression, joy of a life where I don't have to worry about God always being ticked off at me, and peace by living a faith without the trappings of dogma and fear.

I feel my purpose in life is to share joy, to exude empathy and to share what my life was like in hopes others never have to experience what I did.

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A great question, but be careful with your conclusions. The simple answer is my mother and father created me by the incredible act of creation 9 months before I was born when the egg and the sperm united inside my mothers body. All other "spiritual" answers which is intended with this question are a "guess" and a "hope". We all love to "guess" but some of the guesses have to be wrong. If you ask a militant Muslim why he was born, he will beclare he was born to become a suicide bomber, and he believes that so intensely that he over rides the survival mechanism within humans to kill himself and others to receive 72 virgins in the next life. We all know that idea is "crazy", so why should we believe the Catholics who claim we shall go to heaven and look upon god forever in a "beatific vision"? That sounds very boring to me. An eternity of just looking upon god? Or, why guess we shall go to Valhalla if we were a Viking? Everyone has a guess about why they were born, and no one knows the answer, except to say they were born 9 months after their parents had reproductive sex. The reason you were born is simple, it is procreation of the species. The "spiritual purpose" for your life is a "guess" on your part. And you like the militant Muslim are entitled to your guess. But if you don't get the 72 virgins when you die, something about the teaching in this life time was wrong. I really "hope" there is something after death, but like everyone else on this planet, I have no idea if that is true or not. I can accept "on faith" that there is a grand design. But it is an act of faith to believe that, just as it is an "act of faith" to destroy yourself for 72 virgins. Or it is an act of faith to believe I shall be reincarnated as a human being again. There are a thousand answers to the question, and some of the answers are clearly crazy. Other answers I hope are true. I am amused by reincarnation belief's because everyone believes their parents will be waiting for them when we die. Why would my parents be waiting for me? Would they not be looking for their parents to reunite with? The idea that everyone I loved will be on the other side waiting for me sounds rather self centered. But what do I know? I know the same as you. The other side is a guess. And a hope. But everything about death is unknowable, as uncomfortable as that is to accept. Death is simply the separation of the body that dies and the consciousness within our bodies. No one knows what happens to "consciousness" or "spirit" or "soul" when we die. We have faith, hope and guesses, but no one knows for certain. Except the militant Muslims, they know or they would not destroy themselves. Be careful of "absolute knowing". The only person I knew when in the WCG who knew about the other side was Gerald Waterhouse, and he took 4 to 8 hours at a time to explain in detail what was coming next. It seems to me he had a very active imagination. And his explanations bored me to death.

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And my FAVORITE: