A Reminder Just How Dangerous Some Of The COG Teachings Can Be

So many in the various COG's see no problem with all the apocalyptic doom that their ministers continually spout out.  After all, it's in the Bible so it has to be true.  While this is an "old" story of a Church God member, it still has meaning today in light of the horrible rhetoric coming our of Dave Pack, Gerald Flurry, Bob Thiel, Rod Meredith/Gerald Weston and James Malm.  How long will it be till these false prophets have blood on their hands?  How will they lie their way out of it this time?

The video above is a reminder what can happen when people in the church are pushed over the edge by the ongoing rhetoric and lies of church ministers.  Of course they all start making excuses as Living Church of God did when Terry Ratzman murdered LCG members in Milwaukee.

Human Gullibility

Bob Thiel never got the memo

"Gullibility is a failure of social intelligence in which a person is easily tricked or manipulated into an ill-advised course of action.  It is closely related to credulity, which is the tendency to believe unlikely propositions that are unsupported by evidence."  A definition taken from the Internet.

Credulity is "a tendency to be too ready to believe that something is real or true." A definition taken from the Internet.

When I was a young man (I am now 74), and in the military, I heard the "World Tomorrow" radio broadcast which was hosted by either Herbert W. Armstrong or Garner Ted Armstrong.  At that time in my life, I was very inexperienced about the world in which we live.   I readily accepted and believed that the voice of the World Tomorrow program was convincing.

In life there are innumerable voices that speak out and to the general public and very often those voices are convincing in what they have to say.  Many human beings are by nature very gifted public speakers.  Public speakers often have an uncanny ability to persuade those who listen to their speeches, or what they have to say.  This is true not only in religious ideas, teachings and beliefs, but in politics, in advertising and in countless endeavors of life on earth.

I have come to the conclusion that a great deal of success in terms of having power and control over the minds of the general public, has to do with salesmanship.  A commercial product can be sold to the public, as in the Home Shopping Channel or by say QVC (Quality Value Convenience), because the products are presented as the greatest, the best, the most advanced, the "you can't live without this", the most astounding, the "your life will be better if you buy this",  only a few are left (implying you better call in and order now),  these will never be available again, three payment plan,  guaranteed or you have 30-days to return and so forth.

Religion is much the same as QVC or Home Shopping on television. Religion teaches that if you pay tithes, you reap a harvest, if you accept Jesus Christ you insure your eternal salvation,  that if you go to church, submit to your pastors and obey those who have the authority over you, you are doing the will of God.  If you attend annual "Holydays" you will be accepted by God.  If you believe what your preacher teaches and says, you are living in the will of God.  If you keep the Saturday Sabbath, God will smile upon you. If you think and believe "the Bible" is inspired by God, you are among the brethren, who also have faith.

Preachers "guarantee" your salvation "if" you believe what they tell you and you tithe.  Preachers quote certain verses from the Bible, because those cherry picked verses equate to what they want you to believe.  Preachers would have you believe that we are "living in the end times" (never mind that "end times", has been around for the last 2,000 years),  Some preachers invent sayings such as "Manna Fest", "Revival", "Holydays", "Reformation", "Prophetic Ministry", "Slain in the Spirit", "Holy Laughter", "Last Days", "Gift of Supernatural Healing", "Infallible Bible" and endless other terms that seduce the naive and the gullible.

There is a great human weakness in common humans to believe charismatic public speakers, and yet 100% of those charismatic speakers will exist planet earth, the same as all other humans, and they will never be seen or heard from again.  Why do people follow these men and women?  Answer: GULLIBILITY!!!

Being gullible or naive is an unfortunate massive problem with human beings.  The "news" media on public television is the single most lying institution on planet earth, closely followed by the movie industry.  When the "news" speaks, it would be far better to turn the television off, because the propaganda is politically motivated with hidden agendas.

Personally I NEVER trust television "news" or even the movie industry with "truth."  To think that preachers speak for God and represent God, is no different.  A few preachers may have sincere motives, but their entire basis of what they believe is based upon INK on PAPER called "the Bible", which was 100% penned by human beings, very UNinspired by God, but who had motives that are little understood in the modern world.

How many thousands of years will pass before common people stop believing preachers?   How many thousands of years will pass before common people stop paying tithes to preachers, who live in mansions and fly around the world in private jets and who make pretense that they are "anointed" by God?  How many thousands of years will families sacrifice their children, their lives, their time and their pocketbooks to preachers?

There has to come a time in life on earth when the world stops believing preachers.  Going to church is a social activity and indeed there may be friendships, but there is also a $price to pay.  The one who reaps the $benefits of tithing, is of course the preachers.   Human governments reap their tithes from taxation. Tithing is the twin of taxation.  Both are inventions of those who rule by force, compulsion and fear-mongering.  If you really believe you should tithe, why not put your check in an envelope and address it to "God in Heaven" and let the post office deliver it?

In time all church goers have to come to the conclusion that they have been deceived, because no preacher who ever lived has come back from the grave, nor has any other human.  It is impossible to prove that there is life after death, it is just something all humans "hope" is real, and in an existence of paradise.  Most things church members think are true are impossible to prove.  To base ones whole life upon ancient writings of men, none of us know or have ever encountered is quite preposterous.  Personally, I would have to believe that the so called "apostle" Paul was a man very much like Herbert W. Armstrong, who appointed himself an "authority" for God.  There is absolutely no valid reason to believe in legends and myths as if God ordained those men, those writings or those circumstances.


Van Robison

UPDATE: Fred Dattalo Sinks to New Low: Members to cut off contact with non-member spouses

UPDATE:  Will Fred Dattalo practices what he preaches now that his own son and family have left the PCG?

A reader here writes:  

I have heard the Fred Dattolos Son Michael Dattolos has recently left the church and his wife and son. I guess his own advice now is a witness against him....laodiceans policy msg given a few months ago. I guess what goes around comes around. 


The perverse teachings of the Philadelphia Church of God just keep getting worse and worse.  Gerald Flurry recently extended the no contact rule to all children/adults who are not part of the PCG.

Now the degenerate teachings take an even darker party.  PCG members are to cut off all contact with mates and spouses who have stopped attending PCG, even if they are "pleased to dwell" with their spouse.

Fred Dattalo is a sick man like Cal Culpepper.  Both of these "men" hail from Pasadena where they learned to treat the "common people" like dirt, which they regularly did while employed in accounting and the auditorium.

Just heard that Fred Dattalo from Canada made the announcement Sabbath that the No Contact ruling now extends to mates/spouses that have stopped attending. What happened to "if they're pleased to dwell with you?". One member got up and left during services! Why aren't more leaving? Maybe because people want to walk away from their families and they use Flurry as their reason! Sickening! Their love has Waxed cold and they are without natural affection! 

Finally a report that one person had the wherewithal to stand up and walk out!

Leaving the Fold

There is an interesting conversation going on in a COG related Facebook page right now over how the church felt the need to control all aspects of the members lives.  The above quote is from Leaving the Fold by Marlene Winell

Being enveloped by a church that seeks to control every aspect of a members life leads to a false sense of security.  A person meets the warm approval of family members and friends and the church looks upon you favorable, if it is as nothing more than a money making entity.  But dare to step outside that cocoon and the world quickly changes.  Even though the person who has left is healthier, mentally, spiritually and physically, there is still the loss of approval that sometimes creeps in.

An excerpt from the book states:

It has been a wells established fact that those who are in fundamentalist groups, and the COG was fundamentalist to its core, are in it for security and for the sense of belonging to something special.

The Church of God has always presented its self as something special, called out, set apart from, God ordained.  That was the very thing Herbert Armstrong used when he rebelled against the church and started his own version, steeped in extra-biblical interpretations received though special revelations received in the public library or from his god.  His previous association was wrong and he was right. God had personally revealed to him the right and true way.  Those that bought into it were special and set apart from the lukewarm believers they left behind.

Continuing on from the above quote:

The church has always felt the need to have an answer for everything.  Why else would the church have produced hundreds and hundreds of "Letters" from the Letter Answering Department, or the countless booklets, books, magazine articles and hundreds of thousands of sermons.  Having one's questions answered provided a sense of relief knowing that one was no longer accountable and had no need to study or research further.  God's minister said it, so let it be done!

We see this today in the various fringe groups of Armstrongism.  Bob Thiel does it with sermons covering 10-20 different subjects at a time.  Dave Pack does it with 190+ new revelations from his god.  His members no longer need to think, just accept and they will be saved.  Gerald Flurry does it with his members when he threatens their salvation by daring to say "hi" to a family member who has left the fold.  Rond Weinland has led his members to believe they are so special that they will soon be gods, kings and priests in his world a few months away.   Rod Meredith has done the exact same thing by telling his members they are special and set apart from all other COG's. God is doing a special end time work with them exclusively. And then there is United, which has never quite been able to figure out what it needs to be doing, yet they are so special and called out, so much so that even Jelly has more followers than Jesus does.

Everything in the church seems to be exaggerated to the extreme. Doom, death and immediate obliteration is the game of the day for the church.  Members are constantly being warned about one thing after another. Famine, disease, parents eating children, concentration camps, invading Russian, Germans or Chinese armies, rampaging Muslims, all fear factors to maintain control.  As long as members stay together in the fold, they will fight and survive together because God will exclusively protect them.

We were always encouraged to "fight the good fight" and if we did then we had guaranteed entrance into the World Tomorrow where the lion would be dwelling with the lamb and we would be wielding rods of iron over our dominions or worlds.  that all sounds pretty good to this eon the "right" side of ht equation, but no so much for those being ruled over.  But that never mattered.  We were special. We were set apart.  We were God's very one chosen from billions of people. 

All of the benefits that the Church of God/Armstrongism offered always externals. Being kings, priests, world rulers and God was more important than the inner healing of one's heart and mind. Church members were and still are constantly berated as never quit measuring up. We were sinful slobs/worms that God was just itching to blot out.  The glorious rewards of the World Tomorrow were always just out of reach.  God always seemed eternally pissed at us, even more so than the deceived world around us.  It was our fault that Jesus never returned when he was supposed to.  We were not ready.  It was our fault that Loma Armstrong died from bowel blockage because the church was backed up with sin and rebellion.  That list can go on and on.

There's nothing inherently wrong with meeting human needs. However, in practice these needs are exaggerated and used to frighten potential converts into joining and to preserve existing membership. In fundamentalism, the dangers of life -- both now and in the here after -- are emphasised. Incredible threats and promises are made for heaven, hell and miracles here on Earth. The result is that people are disempowered by this approach to having their needs met. Since the source of all the benefits offered is external, requiring dependence on God and the church, internal resources atrophy. This process degrades the self and becomes a serious threat to human well-being. 

It all gets exhausting after a while trying to constantly measure up.  Our brains atrophy because our thinking has been done for us or we finally realize that we are worthless creatures and what's the point of trying any more.  The questioning stops and people just trundle on week after week listening to bland and boring sermons waiting for that "strong hand from someplace" to finally make things right.

In spite of all of that, there are individuals that never settle for the status quo and let that spark of questioning be given space to shine forth and they wake up.  They realize that so much of what they have been taught is not the "truth" and step out into the unknown where questions do not always need answers. Doubt, ambiguity and the gray areas of life then become learning places and growth.

Are you willing to live in doubt and ambiguity?