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More on ID

Thursday 1 September 2005

Thud mentioned “the kind of ID that also rejects short-history ‘the world is 5000 years old’ creationism.” It’s been my sense lately that “ID” is an effort by more moderate believers to distance themselves from the more literal, fundamentalist reading of a six-thousand-year-old universe. Look at the

Catholic church’s official position: the Vatican holds that God created the universe, but it makes no claim as to how he did it. Very sensible, but too sensible for fundamentalists – who often are rabidly anti-Catholic as well.

The problem lies with the fact that creationists – and I mean the hard-core, 6k variety – take the issue very personally. I once stumbled onto a teen message board of a fundamentalist sect and jumped in on the question, “Do you believe in evolution?” I found that the kids’ initial reaction was always an emotional one. “I’m not descended from primal sludge!” was a common theme. While I fail to see how the origins of my species affect my personal worth and self-confidence, the thought of being able to trace the human race back to amoebas somehow offended their sense of personal dignity.

“Something that used to be sludge can’t possibly be a child of God,” they reason. “I am a child of God,” they continue, concluding with, “Therefore, I did not evolve from primordial soup.”

Not the most well-founded syllogism I’ve ever encountered, but these are emotions we’re dealing with, not reasonable, rational responses.

Accepting evolution is rejecting God. For them, it means rejecting the very bedrock of their lives: the Bible. It makes the Bible a liar, because the use of figurative language has largely escaped them as a possible interpretation. If “And the evening and the morning were the first day” (Genesis 1.5) can be interpreted figuratively, so can “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3.16). If the Bible got it wrong about biology, then what confidence can we have in it regarding salvation.

This black-and-white, either-or thinking permeates the fundamentalist world.

All we had to do was elect an evangelical president to see that.

Reading Strobel

Tuesday 31 August 2004

I began reading The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel this week. My parents brought it to me in addition to the two books I’d requested. I’d read some reviews of it on Amazon, and the common complaint against it is that it doesn’t present the other side of the issue. There is a short chapter on the issues raised by the Jesus Seminar, but that’s about it other than occasional objections raised here and there by skeptics. I’ve no problem with this in a way, for the book is The Case for Christ and not Christ on Trial. In other words, even in the title it makes it clear that it’s presenting one side of the story.

One thing I do have a problem with is how much of the argument is based on something being “reasonable” or the alternative being “unlikely.” For example, “Given that Jesus’ followers looked upon him as being even greater than a prophet, it seems very reasonable that they would have done the same thing [(i.e., record his words accurately)]” (41, emphasis mine).

It’s often just conjecture. For example, concerning the casting of the demons into the swine, Strobel points out that Mark and Luke say it happened in Gerasa, with Matthew putting it in Gadara. After the scholar (Blomberg) suggests that one was a town and the other a province, Strobel adds, “Gerasa, the town, wasn’t anywhere near the Sea of Galilee.” Blomberg responds:

There have been ruins of a town that have been excavated at exactly the right point on the eastern shore of the Sea of Galilee. The English form of the town’s name often gets pronounced ‘Khersa,’ but as a Hebrew word translated or transliterated into Greek, it could have come out sounding something very much like ‘Gerasa.’ So it may very well have been in Khersa — whose spelling in Greek was rendered as Gerasa — in the province of Gadara (46, 47).

Goodness — proper understanding of the Bible requires knowing how people could have transliterated or misspelled words! Isn’t the Bible of divine origin? How could this happen?

This issue of divine origin comes up again when discussing the consistency between the gospel accounts. Blomberg says,

My own conviction is, once you allow for the elements I’ve talked about earlier — of paraphrase, of abridgement, of explanatory additions, of omission — the gospels are extremely consistent with each other by ancient standards, which are the only standards by which it’s fair to judge them (45).

The only standards? How about the standard of them coming from a supposedly omnipotent, omniscient source? Of course, apologists like to conjecture that if there was perfect consistency between the gospels, that would be suspect in itself. Perhaps, but there is such a level of inconsistency on basic issues (who saw the resurrected Jesus first, for example).

In some ways, the book is strangely persuasive. I guess it comes from this strange, nonsensical desire to believe again. A childish desire, I suppose — and Christians wouldn’t deny that. “Unless you become like a child” and all that.

Pre-Wedding Seminar

Monday 5 July 2004

So we survived this Catholic church’s inability to treat its believers like responsible adults—i.e., we survived the pre-wedding, weekend-long marriage class. I would say “seminar,” but “seminar” implies more interaction than actually took place. The first half of the first day especially was nothing more than a long lecture.

Kinga and I decided that the people who really need such a thing don’t benefit at all from it, because they don’t really pay attention to it; and the people who don’t need it obviously don’t benefit from it all that much. The price was not worth the benefit in our case, I would say. It didn’t really cover anything Kinga and I hadn’t heard/thought/realized before.

What was especially frustrating was the repetition of the Catholic birth control talk. It began with an attempt at justifying it logically (and of course theologically, and even thought “logical” is in the word “theological,” it often isn’t). The presenter hung up a poster of Van Gogh’s Sunflowers and asked us to imagine we’d painted it. In comes a friend who rips the painting and she had us brainstorm what we would feel toward that friend: anger, surprise, hatred, desire for revenge, etc. were the words that came to people’s minds. She then pointed out that we weren’t physically harmed by our “friend’s” action, but that our creation was. “Ah,” I began thinking, “That’s how they’re going to try to justify the church’s absurd position on birth control.” And sure enough, she pointed out that we’re God’s creation, and that according to the Genesis account (which apparently we’re to interpret literally), we were created with four critical aspects/commands. One of them was our fertility and the command “be fruitful.” So the reasoning went, that when we’re tampering with our fertility, we’re tampering with God’s creation, and so on and so on.

She then went on to frame it as a question of faith, and I believe that was a great mistake. “Checkmate,” I thought, recalling my upbringing. In short, I wanted to talk to her about this and say the things I’m about to write, but I didn’t. If it’s a question of faith in God’s almighty power, then going to the doctor is just as much a questioning of that faith as using birth control. It’s one and the same. Catholics pray to God for healing—and then use medicine. If it’s an act of anti-faith (for lack of a better term) to use birth control, it’s just as much to use birth control.

Another one of the critical aspects of the Genesis account that they brought out was the control over creation that God supposedly gave Adam and Eve. So we’re supposed to “panować” all of creation except our fertility…

The church’s position is an antiquated position based on a time when infant mortality was much higher than now, and global overpopulation was an unthinkable concept. “Be fruitful” makes a lot of sense when perhaps half of the children you bring into the world live to be adults. In today’s society, it just makes no sense whatsoever. So the church is left scrambling to explain a first century (and earlier) tradition in a twenty-first century reality.

Interesting that the woman presenting said that the church’s position was not a question of the church wanting to have as many Catholics as possible—having babies for the church, in other words. And yet, just the day before, the priest said just that. That children were a blessing, and that by having many of them (he suggested three!) we would help our “fatherland” and the church.

The whole weekend wasn’t a waste. There were some interesting moments, but it could have been done in an afternoon as opposed to two full days. And the fact that it was required was ridiculous. Of course those conducting it had nothing to do with that, as they pointed out at the beginning when they said that no one would be excuse for any reason, we had to sit there throughout the whole thing. And then actually said bottom line themselves: “Ci który mają świadecwy mają władca.” “Those who have the certificates have the power.” It was meant as a joke, but I didn’t find it terribly amusing.

Soccer Religion

Wednesday 30 June 2004

After having written a short review of Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code (Okay, I admit it – I have to stoop to some pretty low levels in my English reading while in Poland), I recently received the oddest letter from a complete stranger. The subject line: The DaVinci [sic] Code and The DA Revelation of Avatar Adi Da Love-Ananda Samraj

Dear Gary,

My name is John Forth from Melbourne Australia. I got your e-address from Amazon reviews.

The DaVinci [sic] Code is an interesting book on an important theme: namely the suppression [sic] of the gnostic [sic] strain in Christianity. A suppresion [sic] which has turned out to be a disaster for ALL beings on this planet.

With that in mind please check out The Divine Revelation of Avatar Adi Da Love-Ananda Samraj at:

1. www.adidam.org

2. www.adi-da-samraj.org

A Prophetic Criticism of the “Great” Religions (essays on how non-gnostic [sic] essentially materialist Christianity took over) at:

3. http://www.dabase.net/proofch6.htm

Grace Shines

John Forth

My response, after checking out the links he’d provided, was short: “What exactly does The Da Vinci Code – which is a horrid book filled with historical errors – have to do with a New Age cult?” Of course I knew such a reply was antagonistic enough to get another response out of him. In other words, I realized I was childishly provoking him, but I couldn’t help it. After all, it’s not every day that you get to speak to a cult apologist.

Mr. Forth replied:

Dear Gary,

Thankyou [sic] for your response.

IF you do your hope work you will discover that Adidam or The Way of the Heart created by Adi Da Samraj is not a “new age” cult. Christianity is a cult. Every body belongs to numerous cults. A cult being a group of people from the very small or in the billions fascinated by some object of desire or fascination.

Please check out “Beyond The Cultic Tendency in Religion—-” at: http://www.dabase.org/cultic.htm

You could say that the fascination with the Davinci [sic] Code is a cultish [sic] phenomenon [sic]. AS are the cults associated with The Lord of the Rings, the Matrix films, Star Trek etc etc [sic] Perhaps the relevance to Adidam is that Adi Da addresses in a very real way some of the themes, especially the repressed gnostic [sic] elements of early christianity [sic], mentioned in the Davinci [sic] Code.

Grace Shines

John Forth

Leaving aside the question of what “home work” Mr. Forth thought I was supposed to have done, I took him up on his offer and read – or rather, scanned – the piece Mr. Forth recommended, written by none other than the guru himself: Avatar Adi Da Samraj.

It was full of Things Not Normally Capitalized which were written in Capital Letters to express Their Importance (though he did restrain from some cult/sect writers’ typographical IDOCYCRIES), and basically filled with nonsensical Eastern guru babble. (I’m not suggesting that Eastern wisdom is just “babble,” just this particular “wisdom.”) Some choice quotes:

  • The relationship to Me that is Described (by Me) in the Ruchira Avatara Gita is not an exoteric cultic matter. It is a profound esoteric discipline, necessarily associated with real and serious and mature practice of the “radical” Way (or root-Process) of Realizing Real God, Which Is Reality and Truth. Therefore, in the Ruchira Avatara Gita, I am critical of the ego-based (or self-saving, and self-“guruing”, rather than self-surrendering, self-forgetting, self-transcending, and Divine-Guru-Oriented) practices of childish, and, otherwise, adolescent, and, altogether, merely exoteric cultism.
  • Just so, the cult of religious and Spiritual fascination tends to be equally righteous about maintaining fascinated faith (or indiscriminate, and even aggressive, belief) in the merely Parent-like “Divine” Status of one or another historical individual, “God”-Idea, religious or Spiritual doctrine, inherited tradition, or force of cosmic Nature.

The piece mainly dealt with the issue of “cultism,” which Adi Da claims is endemic in all religions – except his own, of course. His is the antidote to cults. Clever move: take critics’ charges and aim the back at them.

Next step, I decided to do my “homework” that Mr. Forth took me to task for not having done – particularly easy with Google. Soon I was flooded with information about Adi Da, Daism, and assorted goodies.

The Guru

I was initially not sure whether to call this charlatan “Franklin Jones” or “Adi Da.” Indeed, Jones himself cannot seem to make up his mind as far as names go. (names.adida.org) Continually referring to him as Jones makes his claims seem particularly absurd, but since they are currently published under the name, it seems to make contextual sense to call him “Adi Da.” In the end, I just oscillated back and forth.

I found out that – surprise, surprise – “Adi Da” is in fact Franklin Jones, a sixty-something Long Island born “guru” who has been holed up for over twenty years in Fiji , where he dispenses his Eastern-tinged “Crazy Wisdom” (his term, not mine) selflessly. I scanned a bit of his stuff and it was quickly evident that the guy is a fraud.

Jones’ religion, his “Crazy Wisdom,” is not a Siddhartha-type Western understanding of Buddhism, something which might raise the eyebrows a bit of a true Eastern master but cause no real consternation. In other words, it’s not some new meditation method, some slightly commercialized take on yoga (i.e., twelve positions for the supermarket checkout counter). Nothing so insignificant as that.

The claim that Jones make – the heart of his religion – is that he is an Avatar. A human manifestation of God. To frame it in Western terms, Jones makes the same claim Jesus did: that he is God incarnate. As he explains it:

I Am the Divine Heart-Master of every one, and of all, and of the All of all. Therefore, I Call upon every one (and all) to rightly and positively understand My Divine Self-Revelation. And I Call upon every one (and all) to truly devotionally recognize Me, and to responsively demonstrate that devotional recognition of Me in the
context of, and by Means of, the right, true, full, and fully devotional, and really counter-egoic, practice of the only-by-Me Revealed and Given Way of Adidam (www.dabase.org)
.

He is the Set Apart Guide (I can’t help lapsing into some Jones-esque capitalization) for All those Who want to Know the Way. The Way, coincidentally, is Jones himself, so his teaching amounts to how to recognize he is God. Indeed, followers are given instructions that the best way to forget about ego is to meditate on Jones, and since he’s living it up in Fiji and not physically available to all his followers, they’re provided with a photo album to help with the visualization!

Salvation, it seems, is based on fantasizing about a fat, bald, literally slimey-looking (just scroll down a bit) New Yorker with glaucoma.

The only Liberating discovery is that My Avataric Divine Spiritual Presence is Real, able to be tangibly experienced under any and all circumstances. It is not about imagining My Spiritual Presence or manipulating yourself. None of that is satisfying, in any case. To searchlessly [sic] Behold Me and, in the midst of it, to notice My Spiritual Presence tangibly moving upon you in your real experience–this is the great and Liberating discovery, the only Satisfaction. Ultimately, it is the only Satisfaction in life. Everything else is temporary, conditional, ego-based, and disheartening. Only the discovery of the tangible Reality of That Which Is Divine is heartening and Liberating and Satisfactory (adidam.org).

The practice is searchless, ego-forgetting, altogether to-Me-turned Beholding of Me in My bodily (human) Divine Form. When you are not in My physical Company, you can recollect My bodily (human) Divine Form. You can use My Murti-Form, My Padukas, and so on. Persisting in this practice, there is the potential of moving Me to Bless you further. [March 24, 2003] (adidam.org)

I closed my eyes and pictured him for a few moments and the only result I got was a chill running down my back and a brief
paranoia that, like the catchy melody of the latest pop trash hit, the image would keep popping back into my head unwanted.The Suckers and VictimsThe case of Franklin Jones and his AdidDaSes (the name “Adi Da” supposed just came to him; perhaps he just glanced down at someone’s athletic shoes) would be more comic than anything if it weren’t for the people that follow him. The difference between a cult leader and a raving schizophrenic homeless man in a subway station is that someone has taken the former seriously, and that’s a frightening thought. What makes a cult tragic is of course the devoted, mindless followers.Jones’ website speaks of “turning to him,” of “recognizing him,” of “loving him.” It’s scary stuff. But the words are not half as scary as the pictures – images from the inside workings of a cultic compound. Imagine David Koresh made pictures available of what went on in Waco. It might look something like this:And what’s worse is the fact that there are children being raised on this bullshit. Children of followers living on Jones’ Fiji island paradise are taught from birth (i.e., primarily socialization) that this snake-oil salesman is God. It’s difficult enough to deprogram adults who have surrendered (voluntarily or not) their grip on reality, but these poor kids will never have had a firm understanding of reality to begin with, and they’re going to be warped for life. It’s nothing short of child abuse, but unfortunately, such child abuse is legal.Thus armed, I dashed off a quick reply to Mr. Forth:

I read the piece to which you sent me the link, and I found this passage:

All cults, whether sacred or secular, thrive on indulgence in the psychology (and the emotional rituals) of hope, rather than on actual demonstration of counter-egoic and really ego-transcending action.

What is the difference between this “indulgence in the psychology [. . .] of hope” and what Adi Da offers? His form of TM simply offers the hope of getting in touch with true reality.

I suppose, to some degree, as an atheist I would agree. Any time we seek from a religion something beyond what we experience in our senses, quantitatively confirmable through science, we are indulging in “the psychology [. . .] of hope.”

Further, I would go so far as to say that Da is exploiting this “psychology [. . .] of hope” to build up his own cult. And for the record, I am using “cult” in the sociological sense of the term. Like Jim Jones (though I don’t know that Da will go so far), he has holed himself up in a remote corner of the world and refuses contact with outsiders.

Concerning this, Ken Wilber asks,

[Da’s] claim, of course, is that he is the most enlightened person in the history of the planet. Just for argument, let us agree. But then what would the most  enlightened World Teacher in history actually do in the world? Hide? Avoid? Run? Or would that teacher engage the world, step into the arena of dialogue, meet with other religious teachers and adepts, attempt to start a universal dialogue that would test his truths in the fire of the circle of those who could usefully challenge  him. At the very least, a person who claims to be the World Teacher needs to get out in the world, no? (www.beezone.com)

Indeed, what does the Dali Lama think of Da? How is he received in, say, India? Yes, yes, I know that some notables (most disturbing, Allan Watts) have given credence to Da’s claim, but as far as I know, true spiritual leaders don’t have much to do with him.

When I wrote this, I was still unaware of the extent of Jones’ claims to be God. As such, it’s a little flawed, for there does indeed exist a Gnostic element in Daism – the knowledge that a fat New Yorker is God.

Now, as far as this and some connection to that horrid The Da Vinci Code, I still fail to see the  connection. Gnosticism was not about mystical meditation but instead knowledge. “Gnosis” means “knowledge,” not meditation. The Da Vinci Code attempts to rehabilitate the idea of the sacred feminine – goddess worship, in other words – and not Christian mysticism. If that’s what Brown were trying to do in writing “DC” he would have written about, say, Father Pio. Instead, he wrote about Mary Magdalene, the “proper” object of veneration in Christianity as it was originally formulated.

In closing, I’d like to thank you for your emails, and encourage you, if you are involved in Adi Da’s cult, to get yourself out as fast as possible.

I never heard from Mr. Forth again. I suppose he realized that time trying to convert me was not time well spent, and I imagine he’s off emailing other people who submitted reviews of The Da Vinci Code to Amazon.com.The Ultimate Sell: YourselfOne question remains: to what degree does Franklin Jones believe his own nonsense? There are two equally disturbing possibilities. The first is that he simply knows that he’s a charlatan and realizes it’s all a big scam. This seems unlikely, for a conscious con-man, no matter how good he is, eventually slips up.The second possibility is that he thinks he is God. This simply means he belongs in an asylum. Indeed, the only difference between Franklin Jones and the probably uncountable number of Jesuses, Buddhas, Thors, and Jehovahs sitting around in state hospitals is that  Jones hasn’t been locked away. You can almost imagine a large nurse reassuring a pajama-clad Jones, “Yes, Mr. Jones, I know that my salvation rests on perfect contemplation of you. Now be a sweetie and take your medicine . . .”

Circumcision and the Bible

Tuesday 16 March 2004

I was reading this morning, of all things, the Bible. I found an interesting passage in Romans:

Circumcision has value if you observe the law, but if you break the law, you have become as though you had not been circumcised. If those who are not circumcised keep the law’s requirements, will they not be regarded as though they were circumcised? The one who is not circumcised physically and yet obeys the law will condemn you who, even though you have the written code and circumcision, are a lawbreaker.

A man is not a Jew if he is only one outwardly, nor is circumcision merely outward and physical. No, a man is a Jew if he is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a man’s praise is not from men, but from God.

What advantage, then, is there in being a Jew, or what value is there in circumcision? Much in every way!

First of all, they have been entrusted with the very words of God (2.25–3.2).

It is very clear here that Paul is not talking about starting a new religion but expanding an old one. Judaism is a religion passed on by blood with the surrounding culture—there aren’t many converts and there’s no effort at proselytizing. But here’s Paul, out converting people not to anything called Christianity (when did they get that name, anyway?) but to be Jews!

Second, he mentions that Jews are the ones who “have been entrusted with the very words of God.” No mention of anything that would eventually become the New Testament “words of God,” and here is a good opportunity at least to mention the oral traditions, if not the gospels if they were being circulated in some fashion. Proof? Of course not—and proof of what? That the gospels were written later? That’s widely acknowledged. It’s simply indications of the ordinariness of Christianity, of it’s non-divine nature.

And I didn’t set out looking for this—I just decided to read for a while, as I drank my coffee.

XCG Thoughts

Friday 7 December 2001

Last night I spent a lot of time on the internet, and I found a lot of information about the Philadelphia Church of God. I’d found most of it before, but I hadn’t read it. It is, indeed, a cult. It is almost reminiscent of Jim Jones or David Koresh in its horror. From the account of one Sue Hensley:

March 1993 — He compared what was happening in Waco Texas to the persecution that would happen to us.  He told us the Branch Davidians were an example of the persecution coming upon us because they used many of the same terms we did.  David Koresh talked about a “little book,” he said the “lion roars,” he said Christ was the “Key of David,” he claimed his predecessor was “Elijah,” and he preached about the “Millennium.”  Mr. Flurry also brought up Jim Jones & the People’s Temple during his examples of the persecution to come, and he said Jonestown was their “place of safety.”

Regarding the “college” he’s building, Ms. Hensley wrote:

When the announcements were made in 2000 about the land that was being bought for the college, one of the tapes from headquarters told us a great deal of what was planned for the future of this land. They are putting in their own sewage treatment system, so that, if things reach a critical stage, all the members could stay on the property; they would be capable of handling over 7000 people on site. There was also an old airstrip in the property, which they thought could be refurbished and utilized to either “further the work” or to fly people out to the place of safety when the time came. The swimming pool (announcement made in 2001) is also to serve as an emergency water supply in case of fire or other needs. Even the first time I heard these things, it gave me a chill.

And lastly, regarding Flurry’s status:

He has also lately given the ministry some very strict rulings concerning what the ministers should do if a person in the congregation talks to them about something they think is wrong. Mr. Flurry has told the ministers that even if the person is right, they should never agree with the member because it would be disloyal to God’s Prophet.

I used to think that the PCG was just a silly bunch of neo-Armstrongites who were pissed because the WCG made all these changes. On the contrary — they are a full-blown, physically dangerous cult. The WCG was mentally dangerous. Spiritually abusive, even. But it never made statements like this. It never openly compared itself to the People’s Temple. And if Armstrong had been alive to see the Waco fiasco, I’m sure he wouldn’t have compared himself to Koresh. He would have said something ridiculous about it, no doubt, but I don’t think he would have drawn a direct parallel between the two organizations.

The reason is simple: I don’t think Armstrong really ever actually believed he and his group would “flee.” Why would they? That would mean giving up the luxurious lifestyle he’d grown so accustomed to. You can’t buy prosthetic dildos in the desert; Steuben crystal is fairly impractical in the desert; a Rolls Royce doesn’t take well to the desert. He never actually believed it. It was a good way to milk people of their money. Nothing more.

People like Jim Jones, David Koresh, and, apparently, Gerald Flurry, though, actually do believe the nonsense they’re teaching. And apparently, they’re all willing to die for it.

I’ve really got to get a handle on this obsession I’ve had for the WCG and all its splinter groups. It’s really just a waste of time, I know, but I can’t help it. I can’t bear the thought of something sensational happening in, say, the PCG and me not knowing about it. Why? I guess I just want to be able to watch the fallout as it happens.

From a Letter

Thursday 23 August 2001

I’m sitting here watching — guess — Star Wars, typing a letter to you, with Lilly sitting at my side trying to get me to pet her. I’ve already packed once (I’ll be unpacking and repacking again today — I don’t like how things turned out), I’ve eaten, I’ve taken a shower, and I’m feeling all pleased with myself.

So yesterday’s conversation. The more I think about it, the less there is to write about it. Basically, I guess my mom had no idea that I wasn’t a Christian, that I don’t accept the fact that Jesus was the son of God and all that. I’m not sure what she thought my position was on the whole issue, but I guess she just thought that I sort of accepted the idea of a Christ but rejected organized religion. Anyway, we talked about it for a while, and it seemed to me that dad was sort of talking in circles. And it definitely seemed that mom has a much more “traditional” belief set than dad. She’s much more exclusivist (i.e., Christianity is the one true religion and should be shared with the world) while dad seems to be, in theory, a little more open (i.e., “I don’t know whether or not others’ experience in other religions is an experience of God or not — no one can say for sure”). Still, I couldn’t get him to come around to admit that such an admission indicts his own belief system (i.e., there’s no way to know whether what he’s experiencing and attributing to God is of God or something else). The really weird part came in talking about the inerrancy of the Bible. Dad seemed to admit it and deny it at the same time. He admitted that there were indeed contradictions in the Bible, but somehow seemed to argue that that fact didn’t make the Bible imperfect. I really have no idea how he tried to maintain that. It was weird — I honestly didn’t understand a single thing he was saying sometimes. It was like he was talking and then take two cups of flour and add it to the bowl of good tobacco causes lung cancer is a good match for Virgos. Vague connections, but not quite sure how things are intended to look in the bigger picture. It was very disconcerting.

The trip in general was uneventful. We got lost going into New York, though. It was an enlightening experience. We’re going along, looking for exit 6a, counting down. We make it by nine, by eight. I see a sign for 7a in a mile, indicating it’s the left two lanes (we’re tooling along in the left lane). I say, “We’re in an exit lane.” Dad, acting as navigator, says, “Yeah,” sort of absentmindedly as he looks at the map. Another sign: exit 7a, left two lanes, half a mile. Once again, I say something, “We need to be in the other lane.” Nothing is said. And we end up taking exit 7a. As we approach, Mom actually said, “Which way do I go?” In a split second, Dad says, “To the left” (it was more a fork in the road than an exit) and I say, “No, no!!!” A moment later, Dad says, “We’re looking for 6a.” I point out that we just took exit 7a. And thus begins an forty minute adventure in which we finally make it back out to where we needed to be and made it to the consulate. I was shocked, though. Three signs (counting the final one that was over the exit as we turned onto it); two warnings — they still took that exit. I was more amused than I was annoyed. But I quickly got annoyed — mom constantly asking, “Which way do I go?” and dad giving directions. We finally get on 34th avenue and we’re looking for Madison. Dad says, “It’s between fourth and fifth” or something like that. Every intersection, mom asks, “What is this?” Dad answers. “And what are we looking for?” Agghh — I thought I would go crazy.

I still haven’t talked to Marlon. I called him, but he didn’t pick up the phone. Perhaps you could give him my number here and get him to call me? I’d really like to talk to him about all this nonsense.

I still don’t have any firm plans for my time here. Saturday I’m meeting Dave, as I told you; Sunday I’m hoping to visit Michelle; Monday morning I have a dentist appointment. Otherwise, nothing. I’m going to try to call Tonia tonight and see if I can stay with her Saturday night, and maybe try to see Mike Braswell Saturday afternoon or Sunday. We’ll see.

Too much to do.

More Trumpet Thoughts

Sunday 11 March 2001

I was reading today the newest Philadelphia Trumpet (March/April 2001) and there’s an article about the book of Revelation entitled “Deceived about the Royal Book of Revelation.” To begin with, the title reads into it a lot of stuff that I’m not really sure is actually there. I’m not sure it has to do with rulership and such, but of course since it’s written by Gerald Flurry then there’s no questioning it. Interesting, the point about the article that I wanted to discuss explains why there’s no questioning. He writes,

“Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand” (Rev. 1:13). Notice it is “he that reads” and “they that hear.” God uses one-man leadership. He reveals to one man. Then “they” who follow this man keep the truth that God reveals (26).

A few interesting things about this quote. First he quotes the Authorized version and includes the archaic third person singular form, but when he explains it and quotes again, he changes “readeth” to “reads.” This was a common practice in the WCG, as was the practice of re-translating in mid-quote, changing “Lord” to “the Eternal.”

Second, the authoritarian nature of this interpretation of this passage is not difficult to miss. He is all but saying, “I am the only one through whom God now speaks.”

Third, this exclusive access to God’s truth radiates out from Flurry—while he is the most chosen, others (i.e., the PCG members) are among the elect. Sociological analysis of cults will describe them as having a mentality in which they see themselves as the only right people on earth and that everyone else is blind, but it’s still somewhat surprising when a church says this about itself:

Anybody who wants to understand the Bible and world events must come to God’s faithful remnant! There is understanding no place else on this planet! It is the only way you can really comprehend the fate of your own nation, or even your own life.

This is a difficult truth to accept, but God works through His very elect and nobody else. Everybody else is blind. It is that way now, it has been in the past, and shall be in the future! (26)

The anthropomorphic elements continue, of course. “Imagine what it was like when the royal Father allowed His beloved Son to become a martyr for sinning men” (26). Of course this places God very squarely in time.

Flurry’s personal this month is revealing as well, for it shows how he is moving closer and closer to David Koresh-type leadership. He is, in a word, beginning to prophecy outright. Writing about the Supreme Court appeal of the Mystery of the Ages case, he says, “I prophesy to you that, one way or the other, God will provide a way for us to mail that book again” (1). I would dearly love to see what happens five years hence if this indeed does not happen.

PCG Thoughts

Monday 1 January 2001

I was skimming Malachi’s Message this morning and I came upon an interesting paradox in the Armstrongian worldview. It was when I read Flurry’s condemnation of the WCG’s contribution to flood victims:

Dr. Ward explained how the WCG is changing its views about giving to hurricane and other disaster funds. This goes deeper than just giving to disaster victims — who do need help. This is a changing of the Church’s commission established by Christ — through Mr. Armstrong. Instead of spending money to warn the people why disasters are happening, the WCG helps them financially. Soon the world is going to be literally flooded with disasters! God is going to bring it to pass as punishment. Tithes and offerings are going to be spent in vain if they continue this approach.1

Of course such an attitude is not a surprise when one creates such an alterative universe as the PCG as done — they “nihiliate” all concerns outside their own world. But this points to something a little more interesting: the “commission” of God’s church is such that humanitarian aid is less important than warning the world. Warning the world of what, though? It’s fairly simple. Unless the United States and Britain repent and basically start following Armstrong’s philosophy and twisted theology, God destroy them in a nuclear holocaust that only God’s elect (read, “PCG members”) will escape. However, if they do repent, then God will spare them. However, it’s “prophesied” that all this will take place: the white Anglo-Saxons will eventually get their asses kicked by the whiter German Aryans.

So what’s the point of “warning the world” if it’s doomed to failure? I suppose the PCG answer is that God wants to call out a few people for training so that they can help God enforce his petty dietary laws and make sure racial segregation is the global norm. All of this creates an interesting paradox: Armstrongites are “desperately crying out” — “a voice cried out!” reeks of this last-minute, frenzied anxiety — wanting anyone who’ll listen to do so, and then change their ways. Yet they almost revel in the coming delight they’ll have in showing everyone that they were right: Armstrong’s Gnosticism was bang-on and everyone else will be groveling for forgiveness. I think deep down inside, Flurry and his minions (and all the other Armstrongites) are just dying for all hell to break loose, literally.

This leads to another interesting point: it’s amazing the amount of help Armstrong’s God needs. He needed help finishing up the creation of Earth — “putting the icing on the cake,” to use a favorite, worn-out Armstrong metaphor — and so he created angels. He will need help ruling over all these resurrected peoples in the World Tomorrow, so he’s calling out a few people now for training.

Finally, I noticed how Flurry almost always refers to HWA as “Mr. Armstrong.” I think in other theological writings people simply follow the scholarly standard and refer to people by their last name: “Armstrong taught . . .” and so on. But this doesn’t show the respect that Flurry and others always want to show Armstrong. He was not just a minister but also an Apostle, and the capital “A” is important. To refer to him simply as Armstrong would be wrong because a) it follows the worldly standard, and b) it separates him from his divine role. “Armstrong” is just a man; “Mr. Armstrong” is God’s Apostle.

1 Flurry, Gerald. Malachi’s Message to God’s Church Today. South Africa: Philadelphia Church of God, 1995. Page 95.

Ex-Roommate Visit

Sunday 3 December 2000

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Declared God

Tuesday 10 October 2000

“Octavian was declared a god shortly after his death.” This is from the profile for Octavian that I just edited for the Western Civ I book. Being declared a “god” in this case seems something like beatification in the Roman church. Thinking of this, the obvious occurred to me: it’s called the Roman church because it grew out of the Roman Empire and was/is centered in Rome. Surely after Edict of Milan all notions of Roman reality didn’t get subsumed under the Christian worldview. In fact, the Christian worldview grew out of this Roman world, so it stands to reason that certain habits/notions from Roman religion persisted in Christianity. Hence it seems logical that this ritual of declaring this person or that person a god might carry over into the Roman church in the form of beatification. The differences, I’m sure, are enormous, and I’m not so naïve as to suggest that it’s a one-to-one relationship. However, the basic notion is the same.

That being said, even if it were empirical, historical fact that the idea of beatification grew out of the Roman deification of its rulers (which is, to be sure, not strictly a Roman notion and probably exists in cultures around the world — Japan and ancient Egypt come immediately to mind), that would not change Roman Catholic practice. Once it’s been so entrenched, how could anyone change it? Even if Pope John Paul II said, “Look, we’ve come to the realization that this beatification thing is nothing but a carry-over from pagan Roman religion,” no-one would buy it. They’d want to chalk it up to senility. Of course if the Pope said this as a holy pronouncement, then papal infallibility would kick in and then we’d have all kinds of cognitive dissonance.

Bus Jesus

Wednesday 19 July 2000

On the 86 coming to work today I was witnessed to. I was sitting on the foremost single seat, minding my business, when this women asked me, “Jew have Essus in your heart?” I had to ask her a couple of times to repeat herself, but I finally realized she was asking me, “Do you have Jesus in you heart?” She began to explain to me that he loves me, died for me, is knocking on my heart and keeping me awake at night. She had a little flip-book with several verses on individual pieces of paper. She would read them to me, moving her finger along below each word as if she were a mother reading to her child. (Instead of a full stop at the end, though, she had colons. I’m not sure why.) At one point she asked me if I believed in God. When I told her I didn’t she didn’t really know how to deal with it, it seems. She returned to talking about how Jesus died for me, how he loves me, and so on. She also explained that eventually God would close the door. I didn’t know how to explain that any God with such conditional love as the God she is describing exhibits is not worthy of my love/respect.

She was, in all honesty, sweet. She was doing what she thought was necessary. Of course the question is, was she doing this because she wants me not to go to hell, or because she’s afraid God demands this of her for her salvation? I’m sure she couldn’t even answer that question completely.

More Nostagia

Thursday 20 January 2000

I still want to write “1999,” I guess because I don’t actually write enough in here. The twentieth already and all I’ve got are seven pages to show for the month. Rather pathetic, but I just don’t have anything to write about. I’m not reading anything that makes me want to write; I’m not doing anything that makes me want to write. I’m just existing — going to work, coming home, cooking dinner, realizing I’m in a rut only to repeat it the next day.

As I go back and read over entries from my time in Lipnica, I realize that I wrote almost exclusively about two or three things: the changes in the WCG, my new LW friends and the adventures I was having (i.e., drinking in bars, hanging out with Charles, listening to blues with Janusz), and — most frequently — about students. Now I’m burned out on the stupidity within the WCG and its sister churches; I never see my friends from Poland; and I never have any interaction with anyone other than those at work. So what does that leave me as journal fodder? Not much.

I suppose I could write about what’s been happening at work, but what good would that be? It’s just a bunch of office nonsense — nothing remotely meaningful. Nothing, at any rate, worth writing about, I guess. I could write about what happened today — the nonsense with the American History 2 book. Yet to what avail? Will I ever go back and read that entry and think, “Oh, those were the days!” Will I ever remember this at some point and wonder when exactly it happened? Will I ever really remember writing this? I doubt it. On the other hand, I have memories of writing in my journal in Lipncia — I could journalize about my Lipnica journal. And I guess that’s exactly what I’m doing now. The point is, I won’t ever do that about this period of my life, I think. In fact, I believe journal keeping will never again be like it was when I was living in Lipnica.

I went back to read old journal entries about my student teaching to see how much I was writing about teaching — tons, is the predictable answer. I didn’t know how to motivate; I didn’t know how to take charge and give them personal, intellectual freedom; I didn’t know anything. I was an utter failure! Of course it was my first time. As I read about my woes, I realized in the back of my head I was forming mini-lesson plans to deal with the same topics, thinking at the same moment, “I could teach that much better now.”

I also came across this gem:

Sunday 15 October 1995

9:34 p.m.

I am finally back home after a somewhat torturous departure. I cried again, upset with the fact that my last feast for several years (three or four, at least) was such a pathetic failure. I guess the main thing that was so very upsetting was the fact that I was still alone. I spent the whole day alone (except for sitting with Mom during church) and it was just depressing.

Fairly amazing — it wasn’t “my last feast for several year.” It was, indeed, my last Feast of Tabernacles ever. I will never again go to such a thing, and I feel my life is much better for it.

With all the things I’ve done in my life since quitting the WCG, it feels as if — in some weird way — I never attended. I’ve grown so accustomed to Saturdays being just like any other day; to eating whatever the hell I please; to spending all my money and not having to hold back twenty percent; to going out on Friday nights (though I haven’t really done that since coming back from Poland) — it’s unreal. Friday night rituals in Poland became Dudek with Charles or Adam’s with Janusz and Kamil.

Another fun quote:

Winter will always bring memories of Kathe. I will constantly recall the countless times we would lie in front of the heater as it blew its welcomed warm air over our toes. Even when I have been married (Will I get married?) for fifty years, I will recall the cold, dark drives to her house, or the sound of her pulling into our driveway as dinner was being prepared.

The truth is, I never think about Kathe anymore. I talked to Lori about her for a while on 1 January, but that was the first time in ages that I’d even thought of her.

Reading a Fundamentalist

Tuesday 4 January 2000

I’ve had a thought about Christianity in my head since driving down to Abingdon Friday afternoon. I was imagining having a conversation with Stephanie about why I’m not a Christian, wondering what she would say to this and that, and yet another contradiction in basic Christian doctrine.

It all came about from thinking about a book of Maw-Maw’s I skimmed when I first got here. I was sitting by the television and I noticed “Satan” in the title, and obviously became intrigued. I picked it up and saw the wonderful title: Satan Is Alive and Well on Planet Earth. It’s by Hal Lindsey, whom I researched just a little on the internet, but nothing significant. The surprising thing is it’s published (in 1972) by Zondervan Press in Grand Rapids. Who made the decision to publish such idiocy? At any rate, during his silliness, he writes the following:

When man fell into Satan’s hands, God immediately launched His plan to redeem man from this helpless situation. What Satan didn’t count on was that God would be so just that He wouldn’t forgive man unless divine justice was satisfied. And something much more incredible — that God would be so loving that He would be willing to step down from heaven and temporarily lay aside all of His divine rights and become a man. Satan didn’t anticipate that God, as a man, would later to a cross and bear His own righteous judgment against the sin of the whole universe.

Satan Is Alive and Well on Planet Earth (63)

This requires one slight altercation in the Christian definition of God: either he can’t be omniscient or he can’t be completely benevolent. “When man fell into Satan’s hands, God immediately launched His plan . . .” This means that God was waiting for the Fall — he new it was coming, and had planned for it. This makes one wonder how loving God is to create a being knowing that he was creating this being to be damned because of his own nature. It also implies that God didn’t know beforehand — though this implication is admittedly weak.

The whole thing points out the danger in saying God had a plan. When was this plan hatched? Before creation? If so, then he created humans to be damned — at least those who don’t “accept Christ” and all that nonsense. After creation? If so, then he didn’t anticipate the Fall — and he is not omniscient. Of course I’m just butting my head against a cliché wall, for in the end it’s all “a matter of faith” and I realize that such thinking does nothing for anyone but me. It only reinforces what I already believe, just as this Satan Is Alive and Well nonsense probably only reinforced what Maw-Maw believed. (There’s a lot about how Christ came down and suffered for our sakes — this is nothing new. Yet it’s as if he’s explaining it to people for the first time. I suppose the equivalent would be Dr. Clayton reading only intro to philosophy books — it’s filled with stuff he already knows.

Speaking of philosophy, a chapter entitled “Thought Bombs” deserves a few words. He writes that

a few eighteenth-century men . . . dreamed up ideas which have sent shock waves to rock our thinking today.

The contamination of these explosive ideas has been so devastating that it has completely permeated twentieth century thinking. . . . Satan took their concepts and wired the underlying frame of reference for our present historical, educational, philosophical, sociological, psychological, religious, economic, and political outlook. You and I and our children have been ingeniously conditioned to think in terms that are contrary to biblical principles and truths in all these areas — without our even realizing it. . . .

I realize it is a serious charge to imply that these brilliant men, who in many ways made significant contributions to our world, were instruments of Satan to lead men’s thinking away from eternal truths, but as the case against them unfolds I believe the conclusions will be justified.

Satan Is Alive and Well on Planet Earth (84, 85)

That’s a fairly significant claim to make. “He’s basically going to try to show how some philosophers are Satanic,” I thought. “I wonder in how much detail he will deal with these thinkers?” I thought. Of course, I knew it was for the general readership — not for anyone with any background in philosophy whatsoever.

Before launching into these “thought bombers,” he warns, “You may find some of this pretty heavy reading . . .” A nice pat on the back — what I’ve written is so difficult for some to understand, but “it is absolutely essential that we understand how we have come to this present hostility toward God’s viewpoint of life.” He’s setting his readers up for some “heavy” philosophical musings, that’s for sure. With that, he launches his section about the first thought bomber: Kant. I think I’ll put the entire section in:

Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher. He never traveled more than sixty-nine miles from his home in Prussia, where he lived from 1724 to 1804, and yet his original thinking formulated principles which still sway the civilized world.

Until Kantian philosophy began to influence the intellectuals of the age, classical philosophy as based upon the process of antithesis, which means that man thought in terms of cause and effect. This means if A is true then non-A cannot also be true. According to classical philosophy, values were absolute.

The world at large accepted these possibilities of absolutes in both knowledge and morals. Before Kant you could reason with a person on the basis of cause and effect. However, this one man and his critiques began to question whether people could actually accept things which were beyond their five senses.

A modern French philosopher described the Kantian thinking this way: “Kant was able to go definitively beyond skepticism and realism by recognizing the descriptive and irreducible characteristics of external and internal experience as the sufficient foundation of the world.”’

In Kant’s analysis of the process of thought he proposed that no one can know anything except by experience. He believed that individual freedom lies in obedience to the “moral law that speaks within us.”

Kant, therefore, finding no personal basis for accepting absolutes, triggered the ideas which would result in the philosophy introduced by another German[, Hegel.]

Satan Is Alive and Well on Planet Earth (85, 86)

There it is, ladies and gentlemen — in just 237 words he “demolishes” one of the most important philosophers of the eighteenth and nineteenth century. One of the most important in the history of philosophy. And he did it all without having a single primary source. (At least he doesn’t include any of Kant’s books in his “bibliography.”)

Doubt

Thursday 18 November 1999

In its severest form it can lead to the formation of a new religion. In its milder forms, it creates novels and philosophies and spends much time discussing them. I’m talking about the human propensity to create worlds – castles in the air, but without the firm foundation Thoreau speaks of in Walden. Tonight was were talking about Schleiermacher again, and I was feeling the same emotions again – the same, “What the hell is the purpose of this?!”

Two hundred years ago, Schleiermacher constructed a view of religion based on what he called intuition. Tonight we spent two hours discussing our constructions of Schleiermacher’s constructions, then commenting on our constructions of others’ comments about their constructions of Schleiermacher’s constructions. The discussion – always in present simple – treated all these constructions as if they were as real as the computer on my lap. The discussion raged as if it made a difference whether Schleiermacher’s theology was of this nature or that. And the emptiness of the ivory towers reverberated with this for two hours – or some other poetic drivel.

That’s one example of world-construction. Another leads to the following absurdities:

I soon found out the reason why I had received such strict charges to keep [the plates] safe, and why it was that the messenger had said that when I had done what was required at my hand, he would call for them. For no sooner was it known that I had them, than the most strenuous exertions were used to get them from me. Every stratagem that could be invented was resorted to for that purpose. The persecution became more bitter and severe than before, and multitudes were on the alert continually to get them from me if possible. But by the wisdom of God, they remained safe in my hands, until I had accomplished by them what was required at my hand. When, according to arrangements, the messenger called for them, I delivered them up to him; and he has them in his charge until this day, being the second day of May, one thousand eight hundred and thirty-eight. . . .’

This is Joseph Smith explaining how he came into position of and learned to translate The Book of Mormon, which led the formation of an entire religion – or at least a sect. Undoubtedly Smith just pulled this buried plate nonsense from thin air! And people believe it! No one thinks it’s just a little too convenient for it to have happened this way – no one thinks that this leaves the door wide open to doubt Smith’s testimony.

First Day in Grad School

Wednesday 8 September 1999

We had our first class today, and I think I could have easily done without. We really didn’t do much more than go over what will be required of us during the two-semester course. I’m a little disappointed about that and irritated. I’m paying for this — and it’s expensive. I don’t want to go and waste time and money like that.

But it’s possibly a moot point. I had a disturbing realization this evening. It was nothing new — I’ve had thoughts along these lines many times before. But it was a new twist on it, a new perspective. I’m always critical of professional sports: “Grown men [occasionally women] getting paid to play a game!” It seems to have no importance in the grand scheme of things, both in the immediate future and the distant future. It does no good for anyone on an existential level. Well, I guess that’s not quite true — it provides spectators with a few moments of enjoyment. Still, generally speaking, the spectators are the privileged few who can afford to pay for admission or buy a television.

How does that make the ineffectiveness of tonight’s class a moot point? Simple: What good does religious studies for anyone except those of us studying it? What will I learn by spending x years at BU? Some theories; a few ways of looking at religion; the importance of the simple idea of perspectives? Probably. And what will I do with that? Go teach other people the same thing. And what will they do with that? Not much, I’m sure. (This is all, of course, generally speaking.) It’s the ivory tower principle. Such scholarship seems to do very little good for those outside universities. It’s like playing professional baseball: It’s especially fun for those who are involved, and for a few devoted spectators, but for the vast majority of people, it does no good whatsoever.

Religious studies seems in some ways a particularly futile and self-serving endeavor because being able to discuss social elements in religion and philosophical implications of certain theologies will never put an end to the strife and suffering that is attributable (both directly and indirectly) to religion. Jihad cannot be prevented by a thorough understanding of this or that principle, nor can education really do much for those indoctrinated in the necessity of such drastic measures. The same holds true for the Catholic zealot who bombs abortion clinics to stop what is to his mind (and it’s almost always a “he” not a “she”) a religious obscenity and crime.

Maybe I’m just affected with intellectual, existential tunnel vision. There’s always the principle of the butterfly that started a hurricane. Still, it just seems like there are other methods of getting hurricanes initiated (and we do need a few of them, ideologically speaking) that have much better odds of success. Sort of like decreasing volume to increase the frequency of molecular collisions, I guess.

What am I saying? That I want to be a Schweitzer? That I want to abandon my studies (which I worked so hard to be award the privilege of pursuing, not to mention anticipated for so very long) and go off and work in a homeless shelter? Perhaps. But not right now. Rashness is seldom rewarded with success, so, for now, I’ll stay where I am and do the best with the opportunities I’ve been given.

I guess it all goes back to homesickness. I still think about Lipnica a horrid amount, more than I should I suppose. I still think about what I might or might not be missing out on by not teaching there, or what I might not be providing (rather, what I’m definitely not providing) by being here.

Thoughts on Mystery of the Ages

Sunday 28 March 1999

After finishing the two small booklets included in the PCG mailing, I began Mystery of the Ages. It’s been a truly enlightening experience. For one thing, I’ve learned a lot of Armstrongian theology that I wasn’t really aware of. For example, according to Armstrong, humanity was created to finish the job of “beautifying” the earth. (Of course, the ideal of this process are the Ambassador College campuses [140].)

God placed man here to restore the government of God on earth. Lucifer and his angels had been placed here originally. God put them here on an unfinished earth. Remember, God creates in dual stages. Like a woman baking a cake, she bakes first the body of the cake, but it is not finished until she puts on the icing. The substance and body of the earth had been created before the angels were placed here. But God intended for the angels to develop the surface of the earth, to beautify it and improve it. . . .

But Lucifer . . . rebelled. . . .

But still “the icing on the cake” had not been added. God placed man here to do that which the sinning angels had not done (137, 8).

This is a silly reason to create humans. It also seems to make humans little more than a backup plan. “What was God’s ultimate objective for the angels? Beyond question it is that which, now, because of angelic rebellion, has become the transcendent potential of humans” (70)! Armstrong’s angels screwed up, and so God had to create humans. This raises some questions. (One of these questions is a little silly, but I’ll point it out anyway: It makes me wonder about HWA’s materialism. Why? Because it seems a little stupid that he would consider an un-iced cake as unfinished. HWA was always fond of icing, whether the literal kind — I’m assmuing here based on this comment — or the figurative — in the form of all the gold leave and crystal in Ambassador auditorium. Another silly question is HWA’s view of women. He uses this analogy several times — to the point of sickening redundancy — and it’s always a woman baking a cake, as if that’s all she’s good for.) Armstrong often says that Christ’s sacrifice was planned from the “foundations of the earth” (142), but it’s unclear as to whether this was before or after the angelic rebellion. Was it all planned out beforehand, or did God have to alter plans when the angels rebelled? If the answer is the latter, then his criticism against mainstream Christianity can be leveled against him:

Much supposed “Christian” teaching has been that God created the first man a perfect immortal being, but that when God was not looking Satan stole in and wrecked this wonderful handiwork of God. Salvation is then pictured as God’s effort to repair the damage, and to restore mankind back to a condition as good as when God first created him (124).

Yet, since mankind was cut off from the possibility of access to God the Father because of Adam’s sin (128), it could be argued that Armstrong’s theology amounts to the same thing. Christ is to serve as the mediator between God the Father and humans, and this would have been the original state of humanity if indeed Jesus was the God of the Old Testament.

The angels, in turn, had been created to finish the job of creating. This is extremely anthropomorphic. Indeed, the whole second chapter, “The Mystery of Angels and Evil Spirits” abounds in this.

When God created the universe, the angels were supposed to be incredibly happy about this. The creation of the earth “was to provide a glorious opportunity for them. They were to work it, produce from it, and preserve and increase its beauty” (88). This begs the question of why spiritual angels would get any joy out of an eternity spent tending a physical earth. Yet it was more than this, for “whether or not it had been revealed to the angels, it was a supreme trail and test. It was to be the proving ground of obedience to God’s government and their fitness to develop into final finished creation the millions of other planets in the vast universe” (89). It seems that everything in Armstrongian theology is a test from God, despite the fact that God indicates that he does no such thing by saying he tempts no one.

The very reason for angel’s creation shows a weak God: Today, angels “continually walk through the earth to observe and report back to him the overall conditions on earth” (68). God in his omnipotence is not able to do this without the angels’ help, I suppose. He couldn’t even finish creation without them:

To aid them in the work of creating, governing and managing what was to be created, they first of all created other spirit beings on a lower plane than the God family. Angels were created to be ministers, agents, helpers in God’s creation. They were created as servants of the living God (61).

First, the “them” in the first line is God and Jesus, the “God family” which results in Armstrongian duotheism. And the whole passage makes me wonder about God’s omnipotence and omniscience. Couldn’t God handle these things alone? Indeed, why would God create angels? Even if we reject Armstrong’s theory, there seems to be little reason for it. It couldn’t be because he was lonely — that’s a human weakness. It couldn’t be out of boredom — again, a human characteristic. But we’re never really sure, I guess.

The anthropomorphic thought continues when he discusses Satan’s rebellion. Armstrong believes there really was a battle in heaven, as described in Revelation (92). Once he rebelled, Satan “used his subtile [sic] wiles of deception to lead the angels under him into disloyalty, rebellion and revolt against the Creator and finally into a war of aggression and violence to attempt to depose God and seize the throne of the universe” (91). How can spirits wage a violent war with each other? How can a spirit try to overthrow another? The whole imagry requires human form, but of course this is no problem for Armstrong, since God has a spiritual “body” (46, 7).

Finally, after the angels’ rebellion, “God saw that no beling less than God, in the God family, could be certainly relied on never to sin — to be like God — who cannot sin” (94). It seems that the whole angelic rebellion caught God unawares, and the fact that there was actually a “war” (according to Armstrong) backs this up. One can imagine a Milton-esque surprise attack, with the forces of good almost defeated by the initial surprise.

There’s an interesting discrepancy in the chapter entitled, “The Mystery of Civilization.” He writes, “Physically this perfectly created pair [Adam and Eve] had no chronic ailments or tendencies toward diseases or illnesses. This is testified in part by the fac thtat Adam lived to be 930 years old. And for nearly 2,000 year the human life span from Adam to Noah averaged close to 900 years. Think on it! The first man lived nearly one sixth of all the time from human creation until now” (145)! It’s not surprising that Armstrong holds to a literal interpretation of this passage, but it’s fairly interesting that he doesn’t notice the anomalies of such conjecture. If, indeed, Adam lived for such a long time, wouldn’t he probably have been a celebrity after a while? Wouldn’t everyone have thought, “Hey, let’s go see the first human ever!” Indeed, if the average life span was 900 years, there should be archeological evidence of this, references to people living for such a ridiculously long time.

This ridiculousness continues: “Adam and Eve had two sons, Cain and Abel. When they were grown, perhaps till in their teens, Cain became envious and hostile against his brother Abel.” Cain of course murdered his brother and “God sentenced him to become a vagabond and a fugitive” (145). Continuing with the account in Genesis:

Cain said to the LORD, “My punishment is more than I can bear. Today you are driving me from the land, and I will be hidden from your presence; I will be a restless wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me.” But the LORD said to him, “Not so; if anyone kills Cain, he will suffer vengeance seven times over.” Then the LORD put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him (4.13-15).

Now, Cain and Abel were the first born humans, and if this happened when they were only in their teens, where did these other people come from? I can imagine someone putting forth the argument that this dispute took place when Cain and Abel were a few hundred years old, allowing plenty of time for others to be born. Yet Armstrong’s conjecture that this happened when they were in their teens precludes this.

Another interesting outcome of taking it literally that people lived 900 years comes on the next page: “The Bible tells us little of human development prior to Noah, but after 1,500 to 1,600 years human civilization had become so evil that only one man, Noah, remained righteous” (146). This means that all this happened in two generations!

The last topic I’ll deal with is developed directly from the passage about Noah: racism. Armstrong writes that “There was rampant and universal interracial marriage — so exceedingly universal that Noah, only, was unblemished or perfect in his generations — his ancestry. He was of the original white strain” (147). Armstrong provides no Biblical documentation for this conjecture, but why does he have to? He’s the unquestioned leader, God’s called out apostle — no one would ever question this. He continues, “God does not reveal in the Bible the precise origin of the different races. It is evident that Adam and Eve were created white. God’s chosen nation Israel was white. Jesus was white” (148). Once again, no Biblical evidence — probably because it doesn’t exist, and I’m not sure he could twist any scriptures to indicate this.

It seems futile to deny that this is racism. Armstrong contends that “all [Noah’s] ancestry back to Adam was of the one strain, and undoubtedly that happened to be white — not that white is in any sense superior” (148). This seems a half-hearted attempt to avoid the label “racist,” but only an Armstrong apologist would fall for this, I fear.

It is, however, impossible, to deny that Armstrong would have been an advocate of segregation. He says as much in Mystery. “God originally set the bounds of national borders, intending nations to be separated to prevent interracial marriage” (148). He doesn’t use the word here, but he is speaking of segregation plainly. Later, he’s a little more explicit: “God intended to prevent interracial marriages. . . . God had set the bounds of the races, providing for geographical segregation, in peace and harmony but without discrimination” (151). One can only wonder what Armstrong must have thought of the attempts at integration and the civil rights movement in general. Not to disappoint us, Armstrong provides the answer himself: “God had intended geographical segregation, not integration of races” (154). I’ll bet one can find anti-civil rights articles in old issues of the Plain Truth. And I can’t help but wonder what people like the Cowards thought of this?

PCG Literature

Saturday 27 March 1999

I received earlier this week — or perhaps it was late last week — a rather large package from the PCG. (Now that I think about it, it must have been last week.) In it were three books: The Little Book, South Africa in Prophecy, and Mystery of the Ages. I’ve read the first two — The Little Book took about half an hour because it’s only twenty some pages.

It’s really amazing how badly Flurry writes. I wonder if folks had much training in how to write at AC other than the use of small caps and italics. He just changes the subject in the middle of a paragraph, introducing something out of nowhere, then does nothing with it. Here’s a perfect example, right from the first paragraph:

Lange’s Commentary states that Revelation 10 and 11 are one vision. A close study reveals that to be true. The entire vision revolves around the little book. . . . The little book is sweet as honey, but bitter in the belly. It has to do with prophecy. . . . There should be no break between chapters 10 and 11. Revelation 11:1-2 discusses a split in God’s own end-time Church (1).

Perhaps not the best example of what I was discussing — I don’t really care to scour the book looking for an example. All the same, this choppiness is indicative of the book as a whole.

The passage in question reads, “I was given a reed like a measuring rod and was told, ‘Go and measure the temple of God and the altar, and count the worshipers there. But exclude the outer court; do not measure it, because it has been given to the Gentiles. They will trample on the holy city for 42 months'” (NIV). Forty-two months is three and a half years. WCG has been “trampling” for more than three and a half years, I would argue.

Flurry argues that Mystery of the Ages cannot be the little book because “it covers a much more comprehensive subject than the little book” (3). Of course Flurry provides now basis as to how much subject material this little book is supposed to contain, and so it doesn’t follow that Mystery isn’t the little book. He continues, “Mystery of the Ages does not contain seven thunderous messages like a lion’s roar” (3, 4)! However, there are seven chapters in the book, and the definition of “thunderous” is entirely subjective. A minor point, really.

As might be expected, Flurry continues with his anthropomorphic descriptions of God. Writing about the initial revelation of the little book, he says,

The messages of this little book was first revealed 1900 years ago! However, IT WAS NOT WRITTEN UNTIL 1989! . . . If Mr. Armstrong had understood Malachi’s Message, WHICH IS THE LITTLE BOOK, he would have warned us about this Judas-type betrayal. Then God would not know by our fruits who truly loves Him and who doesn’t! God wouldn’t know who would follow Him and who would follow a man (4).

This is a blatant refutation of God’s omnipotence, but he resorts to the same un-Biblical reasoning as proof: “God gives us free moral agency and has chosen not to know our fate individually” (5). This makes almost no sense, as I’ve said before. Humans can choose not to know something, that’s certain. I can choose not to know who won yesterday’s basketball tournament simply by not asking around — by not seeking the information. How could this be possible with God, who is present in all time? All the same, I know to some degree what I’m choosing not to know: I know the nature of the subject matter I’m choosing not to know. I guess the same argument could be made about God. All the same, there seems to be no Biblical support for this idea.

The most interesting thing is that Flurry never proves that Malachi’s Message is this little book — at least not in the way one would expect it. He states it (4), then it’s assumed to be truth: “As we said before, the LITTLE BOOK IS MALACHI’S MESSAGE. And God commands us to “eat it up” (8). Perhaps he waits until the final pages to prove that the little book is Malachi’s Message. “The prophecies reveal that there is always a disturbing connection between an end-time Elijah and the Laodiceans. Do you know of any book on earth that teaches such a message in detail? No other book even comes remotely close. It is clearly Malachi’s Message” (15). If that is supposed to constitute proof, I must say it’s really quite unconvincing. Unless, I’m sure, you’ve already been conditioned to accept anything Flurry says without question.

This idea that there’s only one such book is repeated several times. “There is only one book on this planet that I am aware of that has a chapter — or thunder — about an “End-Time Joshua” (16), he declares, failing to realize that his proof rests on an interpretation of the Bible that he hasn’t proved to many people’s satisfaction. On the next pages, we find, “The PCG has the only book on this earth which proves Mr. Armstrong was the end-time Zerubbabel.” A few lines later, “I know of only one book that reveals this man in a great falling away from God’s truth” (17). At the end, he says, “There is only one little book on planet earth that reveals this greatest catastrophe in the end time” (20)! Once again, I’m not sure how the fact that Flurry is the only one saying such a thing contributes to its validity. “Gary Scott is God!” I’m the only one on earth saying that, but it doesn’t follow that it’s true.

He says in no uncertain terms that,

Malachi’s Message was revealed to me in 1989. GOD REVEALED IT! . . . Malachi’s Message is a new vision from God. It’s a NEW REVELATION — not something somebody already knew!

This new revelation is God’s way of saying that we must give the little book a special importance and the majesty it deserves. Only then can we properly respond to the great Work of God — much of which revolves around the little book (20, 21).

That’s some big claims he’s making for his own work. Of course, it came from God, so he’s really making the claims for God. (It makes me wonder once again, how many times has he read Malachi’s Message? Since it was revealed through him from God, I would think he’d read it many times — at least once a week or so!) He even seems to promote his own writing to a position above the Bible or even Armstrong’s writings: “Malachi’s Message is the centerpiece of God’s work” (22). An organization that says its Christian, yet has a book other than the Bible as its “centerpiece.” A strange situation indeed.

I also got South Africa in Prophecy, specifically because I wanted to see if there was much racism in the book. Not only is it a racist book, but it is also a work of a colonial apologist. Surprisingly, it’s not by Flurry, but instead, Ron Frasier — who wrote the piece on Australia in The Philadelphia Trumpet some time ago.

The thesis seems to be that God gave South Africa to the whites because of his promises to Abraham, and that in turn, the whites are giving it to their traditional enemies. It’s a little unclear who these traditional enemies are, though. One might assume that it’s simply the blacks — those who are “not called” — but there are several references to the ties of the ANC to communism (9, 15), playing on the fears of a Red South Africa. Considering the fact that Armstrong theology has always maintained that the real threat is not from the communist Soviet Union but from a revived Holy Roman Empire led by the Pope and German, this seems a strange change of tactic for the PCG.

Of course there is plenty of the racism I was looking for. (I seem to indict myself by saying that I was looking for it. “If you’re looking for something in a text, you’ll find it,” I’ve said to myself many times. Am I doing the same thing?) Fraser begins this racial diatribe from the beginning, with a startling statement:

A well-orchestrated campaign of disinformation, propaganda, and scurrilous slander has been waged against the South African nation by the combined forces of government officials (both within and without South Africa), the liberal press, leftist church authorities, and the United Nations. The catch phrase of all this as been apartheid — the policy of separate development pursued by the South African government since 1948. What escapes most commentators’ attention is the reality that the whole world has been hoodwinked by this disinformation campaign (4).

I read that and almost fell out of my chair. “He’s an apartheid apologist!” I muttered to myself in disbelief. “Separate development,” he calls it. In Plessy v Ferguson it was called “separate but equal.” In both cases, it resulted in a complete denial of basic human rights to a substantial (often majority) segment of the population based on race.

Fraser minces no words when he talks about race. Here’s a sample of various quotes which can be labeled “racist”:

“God lavished national blessings upon South Africa because a particular race was living within her borders” (23).

“Under British rule, South Africa reaped the blessings of God passed on from Abraham to Ephriam, promises inherited because of their race” (24).

“God showered His blessings on the nations of Israel by allowing the British, Dutch and French to conquer South Africa” (28).

“Land has special meaning for blacks” (36). (As if it doesn’t for whites.)

“It has to do with race, not grace” (52), quoting HWA (The United States and Britain in Prophecy, 1980 edition, 29).

It becomes quite clear that this is a book geared toward racism, but the extent of this ideology is not obvious until the end of the book: “One of the greatest unthruths thus perpetuated in society is that race has no bearing on the achievement levels of various ethnic groups that abound in the melting pot of the earth’s teeming billions of mankind” (52). While Fraser would undoubtedly argue that this is simply because God has blessed the descendants of Abraham, it smacks of the theories in The Bell Curve.

Not only is he a racist, but a colonial apologist: “Colonies formerly governed by a few sterling characters schooled in the administration of a global empire . . .” (49). When I read that to Chhavi, she said, “I have one thing to say to Mr. Fraser: ‘Fuck you.'” I share the sentiment.

One last quote from this most intriguing book: Fraser says that “As Mr. Flurry has written . . . the Russian mind seems to have a particular proclivity to creating, publishing and accepting lies” (17)! Of course, Flurry has lived in Russian long enough to become well-versed in the culture and language and has based this statement on careful sociological and psychological research. He’s not just saying this because the leader of the WCG is of Russian extraction . . .

General Thoughts

Wednesday 11 September 1996

Once again I am shocked at how much better things went today. It was so radically different from the stressful disasters of yesterday afternoon. I had IIA for two back-to-back periods and established, for the most part, their general level. Iaa was an absolute dream—those kids really want to learn English. IB was great too—they put forth effort, which is all anyone can ask of them. Instead of being frustrated and tired, I am excited and tired. I lok forward to working with them tomorrow.

Danuta and I ate lunch with the priest who teaches at the school. He is a nice guy, eager to laugh. I like him. I wish my Polish was good enough to discuss matters of religion with him.

Yesterday, as VI was rushing from the classroom, they all folded their hands in prayer and, in unison, said a quick prayer to the crucifix hanging above me at the front of the room. it was surreal and a bit sad—more mindless religious automatons. I hope these kids question things at some point, though it seems doubtful, at best.

An interesting observation I had this morning: Religion is like dancing—without the music, it looks stupid. When I look at the average Christian believer, it is like watching people dance from a sound-proof both. It makes no sense, for I have great reservations about the existence of the god to which they are praying.

I wish I was back at King on a full-time basis: I would be much more outspoken about my new ideas. I am sure I would get a chilly reception from most people.

When I look back at my beliefs in the past I am struck by their incredible ambiguity. (“Give me ambiguity or give me something else.”) If I had been quizzed as a teenager, “Do you believe in Christ? Do you believe in the nature of his existence and sacrifice?” I would have not known how to answer beyond the shrug of my shoulders. This is especially true when you consider the Jewish nature of the old WCG. I did not even consider myself an Christian then, not in the broader sense of the word.

Something Bigger

Sunday 8 September 1996

It has stopped raining though the sky is still gray. The wind has not really calmed but the gusts have become less powerful. I took some pictures of the stream—I will take more when the level returns to normal. It will be good for comparison.

Last night, on the way home, Danuta asked me if I wanted to go to Mass with her today. (I mentioned that I might like to go.) From that came a brief discussion about religion. “You must believe in something,” she said calmly. “You must have something bigger than yourself to rely on.” I did not say this, but that is why man invented religion: WE frail humans felt a need to have something stronger that would eventually pick up the pieces when things go cosmically wrong. How are you going to comfort who’s grieving over someone’s death without religion, without something that can make it all right, can bring justice and fairness to the world? (This of course deals with Western beliefs, not Easter mysticism.) I told her that I rely on myself. “I never felt peace until I admitted to myself that I don’t believe in much of anything.” “I can’t imagine how I could survive without my God,” she said in response. “Have you ever tried, but really did not receive a response. (I did find it surprisingly liberal that she said “my God . . .” I wonder how open to other religions she is.)