A Member Reminder...

Church Member Bill of Rights

The following are basic human, religious and spiritual rights any person has as a member of any and all religious organizations or church congregations.  

You have the right to expect the church to keep your personal contributions private and should be able to expect that any who deal with such things for accounting purposes will do the same.

You have the right to expect that your membership in any church or congregation is not contingent on how much you give or do not give.

You should also expect that jobs, positions, opportunities or offices are not given based on the amount anyone gives to the church.

You have the right to say I can only give this even if it is not a tithe of your income gross or net.

You have the right not to be spiritually judged or have your loyalty or sincerity questioned based on what you are able or unable to give financially to the church.

You have the right to ask a Pastor if he checks tithes and offerings for any of the above reasons before giving to a church.

You have the right to say "I'm tired and won't be there, " to any and all activities, plays, fundraisers, studies, seminars, prayer groups, rehearsals, practices and sermons.

You have the right to say "I don't care about that."

You have the right to question the advice, counsel or sermon of any minister, elder, deacon or any other person in authority.

You have the right to question authority and to still expect to be allowed to attend your church.

You have the right to question a minister who declares himself one or both of the Two Witnesses of Revelation, a Prophet, the Supreme Watcher of Mankind for God, The Only True Apostle in this Age and any other title or position he can come up with to impress you as to why you need to support him.

You have the right to suggest a pastor get spiritual or psychological help should the need arise. You have the right tell him that the congregation is noticing a trend here.

You have the right to ask why the church believes what it does when the Bible might say otherwise, or why the Bible says something that the church practices that seems scary, weird, inappropriate for this time, out of date or controlling.

You have the right to notice that ministers often quote scriptures out of context 

You have the right to ask all the "how can that be," "how could that happen," "why does it say this here and that there," questions you can come up and expect an intelligent answer. If you are told that you are using human reasoning, ask the pastor what kind of reasoning he uses. If he says "God's," find another church.

You have the right to not want elders, deacons or your friends accompanying the minister on visits to your home to talk to you.

You have the right to discuss or not discuss your life with the minister as you see fit.

You have the right to expect absolute confidentiality and for your story not to show up in the sermon next week, even though "I won't say the name."

You have a right to be called ahead of time when the pastor wants to ask about stopping over.

You have the right, when he calls to say, "I'm tired," "I'm busy," "No, but I appreciate the call," without repercussions.

You have the right to keep a dirty home, grass not mowed perfectly, an older car, red in color and kids that don't say "yes sir, nice to see you sir," in just the right way.

You have the right to watch and read what you wish even if the pastor just got done bashing that particular program, movie or book from the pulpit in his sermon on "Demons in Your Home--Six Ways to Assure Your Eternal Death."

You have the right to ask the pastor not to call on you at work, even if you own the business.

You have the right to say, "I can't afford to take you to lunch." "I can't afford to give you free wood or brick." "I can't afford to fix your house up free," "I can't fix all your teeth," to your pastor should he expect professional courtesies, even if he offers to do your funeral free.

You have a right to expect free use of your church for weddings and funerals.

You have the right to expect these usages are not dependent on you, your parents or children living a sinless life six months prior to the date of the event.

You have the right not to answer questions your pastor may ask you or your children about your sexual practices. If he insists, then insist that you all share together.

You have the right to not let the pastor inform you as to who you can and cannot date or marry.

You have the right to enjoy your sexuality free of church or pastoral approval. Something that is wrong for the pastor is not necessarily wrong for you in how you express yourself to your partner. There is no Bible prohibition against....well you know. And if there were, you'd have the right to disagree with that too.

You have the right to not share which or if you are taking medications or treatment of any sort with the pastor.

You have the right to take such medication and receive said treatment and not be judged as having a lack of faith or trust in God to heal you.

You have the right to seek professional help without informing your Pastor of the nature of the help and you have the right to not be helped solely by the pastor under threat of repercussions.

You have the right to insist the pastor get professional help should the need arise and the man is causing more harm than good. You have the right to remind him that God does not directly speak to him nor express His will only through the mind of the pastor and that makes you uncomfortable if he thinks that is so.

You have the right to be wrong about a many things.

You have the right to believe you are correct about many things without repercussions. 

You have the right not to care about everything that others think you must care about to be a good Christian.

You have the right to tell the pastor he is wrong, mistaken or exaggerating.

You have the right to dress as you wish, wear the jewelry you wish and make up you wish or not wish without being labeled a whore or a goody goody.

You have the right to feel that dressing as if it was still 1957 and only watching Disney Movies or How the West Was Won as proof of your pureness is baloney.

You have the right to not be told that the best times for entertainment, movies and TV was when the Pastor was a boy.

You have the right to like the food he does not like and to not like the foods he does. You have the right to like the schools he doesn't and not like the ones he does.

You have the right not to bear your soul to the ministers wife.

You have the right to like or not like, agree or not agree with the ministers wife.

You have the right to not view the world through the pastor's eyes morally or politically. You have the right to hate the war while he believes the war in Iraq is God's will and thinks it's all in the Bible.

You have the right to expect him to speak clearly where he thinks the Bible speaks for us today and to walk slowly and drink cool water where it doesn't.

You have the right to tell the pastor that that is his opinion and not necessarily the only true opinion on earth.

You have the right for you, your children, your partner and your friends to be themselves.

These are but a few of the rights any member of any Church, congregation or religious organization has. In short, you have the right to not be required to check your brains, your insights, your perspectives and your free will at the door to be welcome and a member of any church.

LCG: Richard Stafford on emulating a man (Rod Meredith) instead of Jesus

A reader here posted the following information about a sermon given recently by Richard Stafford, a member of Living Church of God's Council of Elder's.

From LCG's latest weekly update:

"Mr. Stafford gave a very moving sermon on “Seven Character Traits of the Late Dr. Roderick C. Meredith,” and how we must use his example and build these character traits as Christian soldiers."

How many inspiring examples does the Bible give us of men and women whose character traits we should emulate? As a Bible-believing church, LCG should know of at least a few Bible examples they can follow.

So, what do they teach their members? That they must follow Rod Meredith's example! It's cultish and unbiblical! Even if Rod Meredith had been a man known for his great holiness, it would still be far more seemly to point church members to the Bible than to their dead cult leader. 

On the other hand, if we are going to honor dead cult leaders, shouldn't we first honor Mr. Herbert W. Armstrong? Let's look at Mr. Armstrong's own testimony, in his own writing, of twelve character traits of Rod Meredith:

• blind to self-will

• angry 

• doctrinally correct 

• blind to the spirit of God's law 

• competitive 

• harsh task-master 

• rubs the fur the wrong way 

• rank conscious 

• covets power and authority 

• unfit to lead God's Church 

• repels people 

• has a will to lead but lacks the qualifications

I wonder whether Mr. Stafford discussed more than one of those qualities? Or does Mr. Stafford consider himself a higher authority than HWA or the Bible?  

Enjoy the cult you have inherited, Mr. Weston. I hope (but doubt) you will do something to change it for the better.

This is why websites, books, and blogs like this exist. If any human RELIGIOUS leader is going to emulate anyone, it would be the Master himself, Jesus.  Jesus is the ultimate example of a man RELIGIOUS leaders should be emulating with the qualities and characteristics of what a grace-filled justice-oriented leader would be like.  Has any minister in the Church of God ever tried to emulate Jesus? Most cannot look any further than Herbert Armstrong, Rod Meredith, Dave Pack, Gerald Flurry or Bob Thiel. Most even dread mentioning the name of Jesus.

Dennis Diehl: Mea culpa Doug Winnail

Dennis asked me to post this on his behalf since he is at work.  He would like to make a correction about a comment he made about Doug Winnail the other day.

Dennis previously said:

"From what I understand Doug's wife left him a few years back and married a Presbyterian minister. In time, and I honestly have never heard of such a turn around, she returned to Doug."

For the record:

Doug's wife NEVER married a Presbyterian minister, though Doug and his wife were separated for a while.

Apologies for any direct questions this may bring up for Doug.

Dennis can always be contacted directly here.

LCG Member Has A Question For Gerald Weston

Dear Mr. Weston:

I sat in church listening to you speak about church members who read and/or participate on “hate blogs.”  I have been a member of God’s church for well over 40 years and have witnessed much of its growth and transformation into what we are today. I made the move out of the Worldwide Church of God during its apostasy from the truth into the Global Church of God when Mr. Meredith started it.

With many of us that came over to the GCG were many ministers and elders. These men carried on in GCG just as they did in WCG.  Many were still gracious and loving while many were also still as abusive and controlling as they were in WCG.

Church members are sick of the abuses still going on and that is why we come to these so-called “hate blogs” to air our grievances and concerns.  Concerns of which you seem to deliberately turn a blind eye to.

My question to you Mr. Weston is, why after all of the many abuses and stories told here do you fail to do anything?  You in essence have called all of us liars. You have been made aware of the things said here and cannot sit idly by any longer.  Have you no integrity to do what is right and correct these abuses? God will certainly hold you accountable if you fail to do anything. 

Name deleted by request

Last Issue of The Journal: News of the Churches of God

Issue 202

Issue 202, the last issue of The Journal is out. 21 years of publishing news and articles from across the turbulent landscape of the hundreds and hundreds of Churches of God. Articles were written by members and ex-members covering the gamut of church upheavals, doctrinal issues, newfound beliefs and rejection of beliefs. And then there was the advertising, oh, the advertising!  Sometimes it was the best thing to read in the issues and many it was whackier than hell. Many times those ads were filled with prophecies that were immediately expected to be happening. So far Jesus has returned so many times we have all lost count.  We have been to Petra and back again, again, and again. The "sure word" of prophecy has never been unsure!

Some highlights of the last issue:

Linda Cartwright discuss what it was like publishing The Journal:

Publishing THE JOURNAL has been our effort to keep the avenues of communication open between us and all of our brethren in the Churches of God after the doctrinal upheaval in the Worldwide Church of God. 

We have also wanted to provide a forum for people to air their points of view on doctrinal issues who would never have been able to while in our former affiliation. 

You have not needed to have ministerial credentials or approval to get an article published in THE JOURNAL. We didn’t have to agree with your article. Our basic requirement was civility in your presentation. 

Members in and out of the World- wide Church of God had been studying their Bibles for years. They had so much to say it was almost over- whelming.

Sometimes it was hard for some of our readers when we published articles they disagreed with. Our premise was if you read only things that you agree with how do you ever learn anything new.

Most of the groups that were in existence or came into existence after the various breakups of the WCG had their own publications to promote their tenets and beliefs and would never publish anything that wasn’t sanctioned by their particular organization.

We were not that way. It was our newspaper. We couldn’t be compelled to print something by any organization.

Of course we lost subscribers now and then, and we were vilified from the pulpits of some organizations because, and I quote, “no one controls THE JOURNAL” (which we considered a compliment). 

Molly Antion remembers life at Ambassador College and in the church.

There is a review of Wade Fransson's latest book from his trilogy "Rod of Iron."

Unveiled are frankly astounding discoveries on subjects as diverse as quantum mechanics, classical physics, free will, the inside story of Too Big to Fail, its relationship to Babylon the Great, the identity of the Beast and the fulfillment of the most important biblical prophecies are those I can but mention without spoiling anything for the reader.

Morris Foster has an article on "Who is my brother?"

It is my objective to speak the truth in love. To do this, I must address the elephant in the room in some of the Church of God organizations.

That elephant is the desire of some COG organizations to discredit others, claiming they are not brothers and sisters because they do not attend their man-made organization, thus denying their brother and treating them (God’s children) in an ungodly way. 

----- 

Among the Church of God organizations, unfortunately, there have been a lot of war stories.

These have been on my mind a lot the last few years.

Let’s replace war stories with love stories. Let’s have a heart to follow Christ’s example and the instructions we have read in Scripture and in this article.

Let’s meditate, and follow through, on ways we can love our brothers. Let’s pray for our brothers. Let’s do random acts of kindness to them. Sometimes you can simply wear peo- ple down with kindness.

Let’s let God use us to give the love of God to our brothers. Let’s build real love stories that will just melt the hearts of our brothers.

Let’s inspire love stories that will be repeated for decades—and generations.

Let’s resolve to maintain our relationships with our brothers, wherever they may attend or not attend.

Who can you reach out to and rekindle a friendship with? Maybe reignite a friendship that has dwindled on the vine? 

Art Mokarow...oh my.... Art seems to have replaced Herbert Armstrong as the teacher of the brethren. God's truth has never had a greater mouthpiece than Mokarow.

I was in the house on Lakeshore the night I heard
Art passed away.
I guess I thought he’d live forever. He helped
shape my thoughts each day.
Now, the world looks somewhat different than it
did before this tune.
He was my greatest inspiration, and that’s why
I’m telling you.
He taught me from The Bible how to learn and
discern the truth.
Sometimes he talked too loudly. I guess he didn’t
want to see me lose.
He made me humble in the realization that we
were just two clumps of dust.
But he was my greatest inspiration ’cause he
taught me who to trust.
So I am kind of lost in a world without Mokarow.
Now who will expound what’s truth to me?
Then I remembered what he taught me about
God’s Spirit.
And how that’s all I’ll ever need.
He spent his life studying the Bible . . . spent his
money to publish and send.
God said: Where your heart is goes your
treasure.
He was faithful to the end.
If I had one last tough Bible question, I’d want
Art to sort it out,
An honest voice of reason who just wanted to
serve God.
Still, I’m kind of lost in a world without
Mokarow.
Who will now expound what’s truth to me?
Then I remembered what he told me about God’s Spirit
And how that’s all I’ll ever need.
And how that’s all we’ll ever need.

J. Phillip Arnold as an article "Who Taught Herbert Armstrong."  He makes the claim Herbert Armstrong took teachings from Ezra Taft Russell (Jehovah's Witnesses) and conscripted s his own.

Stop and think. If I could show you proof that the Russell circle(s) taught these two exact doctrines over 50 years BEFORE HWA, would you be willing to consider that HWA may have gotten these ideas from Russell’s circle one way or the other?
 

If he did, it would mean that the two MOST DISTINCTIVE doctrines that HWA taught were taken from the Watch Tower circles! Something he never admitted publicly. Something he denied. Something that may have been covered over by that first generation of ministers and Ambassador graduates—if they even knew. 

It would mean that HWA’s debt to Russell was never admitted or paid.

Netflix has a new movie up that features Harry and Sarah Sneider:

Sarah Sneider announces an “inspiring” documentary film called "Impossible Dreamers" that features her and her late husband, Harry Sneider, available at Netflix and Amazon.