"Briarwood Presbyterian Church is Vestavia Hills is trying to establish its own police force…Some lawmakers argue allowing a private church to have its own police force could begin a slippery slope."
Briarwood Presbyterian Church, located in Birmingham, Alabama, wants its own police department, according to a report by the local ABC affiliate (see screen shot below).
Another news source – al.com – reported on this development yesterday. Here is how the article begins:
Briarwood Presbyterian Church and Briarwood Christian School want their own police department and a bill proposing it passed 9-2 in the House Public Safety Committee on Thursday, Briarwood's attorney said.
The same bill passed last year but got to the governor late and never received a signature, said attorney Eric Johnston, who drafted the bill for the church.
As the above excerpt indicates, Alabama lawmakers previously passed a bill allowing Briarwood Presbyterian to establish its own police department. WIAT, the local CBS affiliate filed this report:
This WIAT news report aired in August 2015. Governor Robert Bentley did not sign the passed bill into law. Anyone have the scoop on why the governor did not add his John Hancock?
One and a half years later, Briarwood is making another attempt to have lawmakers make it legal for them to create their own police department.
Al.com provided this additional information:
Johnston said he expects the bill to again pass both the House and Senate and believes Gov. Robert Bentley will sign it into law.
Some critics of the bill have questioned why the church and school need a police department, but it's essentially a way of hiring a police officer full-time, as opposed to relying on off-duty police officers to assist the church, Johnston said.
"We've got over 3,000 events a year that take place at Briarwood – going on all day, all night, at the school, at the church, at the seminary," Johnston said. "We have to hire policemen all the time. It would be so much easier to have someone on staff."
Johnston said he doesn't know of any other churches in Alabama that have their own police departments, but he said it's more similar to a small college having its own police department. "Briarwood is larger than most of the colleges that have police," he said.
According to this source, the bill proposed in 2015 was in response to the church shooting in Charleston.
A representative from Briarwood Presbyterian told the local ABC affiliate that the officers would answer to the leadership section of the church. The ABC affiliate further reported that Representative Connie Rowe (R-Jasper), a former police chief, supports Briarwood's establishment of its own force. Finally, that ABC report stated:
“They will conduct their own investigations,” explained Rowe. “They will conduct their own security. They will make their own arrests and instead of calling on the local law enforcement agency to take over the particular situation they're trying to control, they will do that themselves. All they will utilize from their other law enforcement agencies is their lock up facilities.”
Rowe says she would also consider requests from other churches to do the same.
England is concerned about transparency.
In our almost eight years of blogging, we have reported on an incredibly large number of cover-ups by churches that failed to notify authorities about alleged criminal activities involving church members. Should Alabama lawmakers and the governor approve Briarwood's request to create its own police department, would this become a precedent for other churches? If so, we believe there will be dire consequences.
We are absolutely stunned that Briarwood Presbyterian Church having its own police force may soon become a reality.
Perhaps this church name rings a bell for you, as it has for us. To learn about Briarwood Presbyterian, you can consult the Wiki article where you will be reminded that it was this church that established Campus Outreach. Also, the church website provides background information on Campus Outreach. I (Deb) first became concerned about Campus Outreach when I discovered that some CO college ministries have a rule where participants must get approval from their leaders to date someone. It appears these leaders are micro-managing the lives of the students who become involved with Campus Outreach.
We will continue to follow this story and bring you any updates. What are your thoughts regarding churches having their own police force?
Wow that church has nerve!
That is so far beyond creepy…I have no other words.
Why don’t they just declare themselves an independent country (the Vatican did it!) and see what happens.
@ Rachel: Agreed!
Church cops? Things would have been so much better if only Jesus had thought of that.
I’m sure the lead pastor is very excited to add “God’s Sheriff” to his list of titles. He’ll be the envy of all the other mega-pastors, showing off his customized badge with gold inlays.
MidwesternEasterner wrote:
Yep.
What could go wrong? Here is another 9 Marks church that demands that I submit to leadership. The 9 Marks church that excommunicated me threatened police action when I showed up to try and defend myself against my pastor/accuser. The 9 Marks church replant threatened police action based on my mere presence on campus since I disagreed with their membership policy.
Now the elders will have police authority?
“Put your sword back in its place,” Jesus said to him, “for all who draw the sword will die by the sword. Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels?”
Dale wrote:
Scariest scenario I have ever seen. No way would I be part of such Marxist church (if you want to call it a church).
PCA church…interesting….
@ Dale:
We will get back to your story soon, I promise!
Sheriff Reeder wielding the keys to his kingdom.
@ Divorce Minister:
You might find this factoid from the Wiki article on Briarwood interesting:
well, the Vatican has its own ‘guard’, the Swiss Guards, who keep the peace in Vatican City …. but Vatican City is an independent ‘state’ of its own
Do separatist Mormon polygamous cults have their own ‘police force’? If yes, what has happened that is known?
I could see having some private security on hand on a large Church campus, but only as ‘guard duty’ to notify the regular police of trouble.
This place is more like a ‘cult’ or a ‘cult’ in progress which will get its way as long as it has political backing …. look at the influence of Doug Wilson’s cult in Moscow, Idaho….. we can see something in what has already played out in certain cults, yes
Honestly, in this day when our mentally ill have now been awarded gun rights, security IS important …. but in a cult, a private police force is at the service of them what runs the cult, and God help those who oppose the ‘leadership’.
Not good, but in the political climate we are now in, nothing surprises anymore.
Dale wrote:
Exactly.
I had the same experience with my former gulag/9 Marxist organization Grace Bible Fellowship of Silicon Valley.
I was to be “disciplined” by the chairman of the elder board for being in “sin” and to assume responsibility for the genetically inherited brain disorder and major memory problems of a woman church member, who has refused all medical care and support groups for her disability. When it all goes wrong she accuses other people, including me, of “lying” because she can’t remember entire events and conversations. At GBFSV they don’t believe in medical care but in blame shifting. The senior pastor has a fake Ph.D. that costs $299 from a diploma mill. He constantly engages in the Unauthorized Practice of Medicine, a crime in my state.
I have never been threatened or disciplined so many times for so many bizarre things as I was at that church of nutcases!
The chairman of the elder board pulled his last stunt on me when I was acutely ill with a serious lung condition, I had been gone from church for 5 weeks, in and out of the hospital emergency room for acute breathing problems, having to get weekly or twice weekly breathing treatments, and getting only 2-hours of sleep a month for more than 2 months due to breathing problems.
Just what everybody needs when they’re acutely ill, right?
@ Dale:
FYI- Pastor Reeder and his wife are originally from Charlotte. He was scheduled to have open heart surgery on February 5.
https://briarwood.org/in-perspective/home/ask-the-pastor-vlog/
Also, he's a Council Member for The Gospel Coalition.
What happens if a pastor or elder is found to be doing something breaking the law? Do they follow civil law or God’s law?
@ Kathi: Excellent question!
Police department …… do they want their own jail, too?
How about judges and a courthouse, truancy officers, post office, and a highway dept.?
MidwesternEasterner wrote:
The Swiss Guard serve as an ‘army’, but they are primarily responsible to protect the Pope and to keep the peace in the Vatican City State. They have a very interesting history.
Deb wrote:
‘Curiouser and curiouser!’
(quoting Lewis Carroll’s ‘Alice’) 🙂
Nancy2 wrote:
the beginnings of ‘Dominionism’????
Deb wrote:
So, would Briarwood use a police department to enforce Complementarianism! Snort!
Christiane wrote:
Next thing ya know, they’ll want their own IRS.
https://briarwood.org/webstore/product/christian-manhood-illustrated/
Christiane wrote:
Yes, speaking of “Sharia Law”…I think this is it.
If I'm not mistaken, one of the cities in Utah supported by its local religion has just been asked to disband it's police force because they let believers slide and unfairly targeted unbelievers. It's not that it hasn't been done before – but when it has been done, it's partial and therefore cannot be just: "A jury concluded that the neighboring towns violated the constitutional rights of nonbelievers by denying them basic government services such as police protection, building permits and water hookups. The police department was found to have arrested nonbelievers without having probable cause and made unreasonable searches of property."
Deb wrote:
Yeah, I had a run in with a PCA pastor back in the day. But I also have good friends in there as well. It is FAR too rigid and Reformed a denomination for me.
Plus, the way they elevate the Westminister Confession of Faith borders on treating it like the Bible. Coming from Mennonite roots, that dog don’t hunt for me 😉
Maybe they love Calvin so much that this is step one in instituting a Geneva-like community? I dunno.
A group with history of controlling people (e.g. telling who can date) gets a police department…what could possibly go wrong? Right.
I believe they have a hidden agenda. Why not just contract with a private security company?
I am sure it would be cheaper than having your own police force.
I’ve read about this.. somewhere before..
While they were going, behold, some of the guard went into the city and told the chief priests all that had taken place. And when they had assembled with the elders and taken counsel, they gave a sufficient sum of money to the soldiers and said, “Tell people, ‘His disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep.’ And if this comes to the governor’s ears, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.” So they took the money and did as they were directed. And this story has been spread among the Jews to this day.
There is nothing new under the sun.
Divorce Minister wrote:
LOL …. sorry, but that WAS funny
The question that comes to MY mind is why colleges have private police forces.
PaJo wrote:
Ours don’t (California). They may have campus security. Their law enforcement officers are through the Sheriff’s Department.
Velour wrote:
U.C. Berkeley has a police department. Only really big campuses have them. But they are full-functioning law enforcement agencies.
The state legislature passed requirements for all California police officers:
http://ucpd.berkeley.edu/our-divisions/administration/office-chief/uc-police-history
Christiane wrote:
Can you say “Danites”?
Nancy2 wrote:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUjLE_N1Cuc
This would mean that members of Briarwood Presbyterian Church and Briarwood Christian School and those visiting the campus, would have no recourse to outside authorities in the event of a crime such as domestic violence, child sex abuse, rape, theft, etc. This church would be a law unto itself. Add the repeal of the Johnson Act and we are entering into very dangerous waters in which local church bodies will only be answerable to themselves. Flashing Danger Sign!
Kathi wrote:
I think we all know the answer to this question. 😉
Christiane wrote:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danite
Todd Wilhelm wrote:
Loyalty problems.
Jamie Carter wrote:
Just imagine how folks who aren’t in lock step with Briarwood’s beliefs would be treated if they had their own police force. This is scary stuff. I’m not a lawyer but if BPC were able to have their own police force, wouldn’t they be violating the First Amendment?
Divorce Minister wrote:
Exactly! A group with Patriarchal views on marriage, gender roles, domestic violence, rape, parental abuse, wife abuse, child abuse, etc. who are control of the law on their church campus spells trouble. Big Trouble. They could start acting like a mini-sovereign nation who ignores the laws of the United States, preferring their own understanding of God’s Laws to take precedence over what they perceive to be Man’s Law.
Velour wrote:
Yes, this is how it is in Pennsylvania as well. If a crime is committed on a college campus such a rape or theft, the local police force in that jurisdiction is called on to handle the case.
Universities are more invested in hiding crimes which might affect their campus public relations. I’ve always thought that campus police were not ideal, and worse was the ways they chose to deal with serious situations like rape and assault.
8 reported rapes at Wagner College; police not notified — here’s why:
“In cases of sex assault or rape, cases are reported to campus personnel and are then handled by the school disciplinary system — a tribunal consisting of teachers, faculty and sometimes students, who — critics say — have very little, if any, training on how to deal with such cases.”
http://www.silive.com/news/index.ssf/2016/10/eight_rapes_at_wagner_college.html
I understand that hiring off-duty police for traffic and such might be a pain, but this is just a bad idea all around.
Can i say this is a recipe for covering up abuse and scandles? What law enforcement training would the leadership have for law enforcement to have to get their orders from leadership in this church?
A police force that answers to the leadership of the church? Even though they would be duly licensed by the state to do so it would be ripe for abuse by a leadership that has no clue or understanding of what law enforcement really is. Good luck with that.
Hmm…I dont see the justification, legally and practically, for allowing a church to create ita own police force. If they have that many events, hire a security company or create security guard positions on staff, and make them responsible for protecting property and people, but always, ALWAYS answerable to the local civil authorities. Do not give a church – any church – the power of having their own police force. It is a recipe for abuse and any church that insists they need one is too into power.
Divorce Minister wrote:
Yep, you give control freaks like these half a gap, and they’d want all of the civil authority, not just a police state in their little, false gospel church’s grounds. This will be a small Geneva. Oh, but seriously, you give ’em control and bloodshed is sure to follow.
This is bad news, horrible news, but news I have been expecting. It runs in their “theology.” (See Calvin, Augustine, Luther). I feel sick.
Velour wrote:
Kristallnacht, Velour.
Deb, it is indeed a small world. Christ Covenant was the first church I attended as a Christian. I was a member “under pastor Reeder” there from 1992 to 1998. Harry is one of the strongest-willed persons that I have ever met.
Does the pastor/leadership at Briarwood Presbyterian Church believe in theonomy/reconstructionism? If so, it would be especially dangerous for them to have their own police force.
Harry Reeder is a so-called "expert" on church revitalization. Mark Dever and he were invited speakers together:
http://www.inlightofthegospel.org/?p=8286
@ Dale:
A small world indeed…
I toured the church website. Briarwood makes it clear — the first thing they explain — is the money they want from members. There’s three weeks of wringing a financial commitment out of folks for the next year. Crass. Why not let the Holy Spirit lead people?
Reading this gives me a sinking sense of horror to come. It is a bad, bad, bad idea.
Velour wrote:
Up next: Briarwood IRS.
If the Sovereign Nation of Briarwood gets its own police force, how many more churches will follow suit?
Kathi wrote:
Are they even remotely familiar with conflict of interest. There is no way IMO a church member would get a fair hearing if they are charged with something.
Todd Wilhelm wrote:
Exactly. Why don’t they just have a “Security Department”? Why does it have to be a “Police Department”?
Velour wrote:
Sounds like a local theocracy, but maybe that’s just me.
If if it was a mosque asking to establish a police force the entire country would be going berserk.
JYJames wrote:
A private security force isn’t oppressive enough.
JeffT wrote:
Why do these people put up with this nonsense??
Christiane wrote:
YES. In Hildale, Utah / Colorado City, Arizona (the twin towns), it’s called the Marshal’s Office and they worked as the arm of Warren Jeffs for years. There’s been some talk of revoking the Arizona POST certifications of the officers who work for the Marshal’s Office, but I don’t see anything more recent than July of last year. However, I do know that the Marshal’s Office was cited as an issue in one of the civil rights cases brought against the twin towns that was heard in federal court last year.
If someone was going to fight this in Alabama, I would say to look into the issue of POST certification of the Marshal’s Office in Colorado City, Arizona. It’s not directly on point, but will work.
Or you could just ask how people would feel if Scientology got its own private, state-chartered police force.
@ Muslin, fka Dee Holmes:
Even in the Hilldale/Colorado City case, the police force was established by a local government, not a religion. The problem was that a particular religion composed an overwhelming number of the voting population. In this case, a particular religion is being given it’s own police force with no color of local government at all. To me, that has to be unconstitutional as an establishment of religion.
Wiki says Briarwood has 4,100 members. How bad do the 4,100 members of that church have to be for the church to need it’s own private police dept.?
This is so bad, it doesn’t even need to be argued.
I visited Briarwood at its old campus back in the day some 35 years ago. The pastor then, Frank Barker, was a nice guy.
I visited the new camps about 17 years ago.
I can’t for the life of me think why Briarwood would think this would be a good idea.
@ Christiane:
You do realize that most everything you wrote here could be applied to Catholicism and its leaders throughout the ages?
Nancy2 wrote:
Who would the Police Force police?
I’m not against the idea of responsibly packing heat in church, but surely a megachurch can find the $$$ to hire private security. Do they actually need 3,000 events per year for 4,100 members?
In 2008 Briarwood flew my wife and me to Birmingham for a long weekend to interview for an open pastor position. We had a great time and met a lot nice people. The “Great Recession” began shortly after that and the position was not filled for several years.
It saddens me to read this. I have much respect for what the Lord has done through BPC (the least of which is the formation of the PCA denomination) and still keep up with the pastor from time to time. However, I have serious misgivings with this or any church having its own police force, or even a security team. That’s all any megalomaniacal pastor needs (I am not referring to Harry Reeder with this statement), to have a gun and arrest authority at their disposal.
Unbelievable.
JeffT wrote:
Exactly! I’m for neither.
Some people do seem to be quite naive, though. If the word “Christian” appears they believe “whatever is accompanied by the word” is a better thing.
NJ wrote:
Do you really believe that number? I don’t. That number equals over 8 events per day, 365 days a year. That is absurd, unless a trip to the bathroom by Reed is counted as an event . . .
If this happens, would it spread to other 9Marx churches? Or other churches in the Birmingham area? Imagine Pastor/Sheriff David Platt. Or Chris Hodges, with a Precinct for each of his satellite churches, even the ones in jails. And then ARC could franchise the idea, and plant Precincts all over the US.
Birmingham is starting to rival Louisville for nuttiness.
JYJames wrote:
The Tithing Units.
When I first saw news of this on Twitter and Facebook, and read the reports, my immediate thought was that this is on the fast track to multiple kinds of legal challenges and lawsuits. Such as:
Separation of church and state issues.
Or, incidents of “wrongful imprisonment” or “kidnap” for being held by church police because this is not exactly functioning fully inside the legitimate legal system and even if it got state legislative approval, this seems ripe for presentation to higher courts to adjudicate the legality of such a system.
And taxpayer lawsuits about privatized use of public facilities, since taxpayers paid for jails, even if church police use a rent-a-cell system.
Or one failure by “church leaders” who oversee their police force — or by those they hire as police — to report infractions of local, state, and/or federal laws as required by law.
I don’t think this is going to accomplish what Briarwood apparently hopes it will. If this goes through, the church, and any individuals and political entities who allow this system to be set up, should expect to face consequences — perhaps for years.
I am completely fascinated and simulatenuously extremely unsettled and unnerved by this hyper-authoritarion trend going on in evangelical and conservative church culture. I have my personal sociological theories as to why it’s occurring, but it’s hard to certainly pinpoint it in the midst of it all happening. It continues to bewilder and confuse me.
One thing for sure is it is going to produce some interesting academic dissertations and church history work/reflection starting in about 50-100 years.
Bridget wrote:
“Just like Fill-in-the-Blank, Except CHRISTIAN(TM)!”
Speaking of church police forces, what does Scientology call the Guardian’s Office these days? (And Scientology even has its own prison/GULAG system, the Rehabilitation Project Force/RPF — maybe that’s next for 9Marx?)
Bridget wrote:
You never know…
“WE ARE UNITED BEHIND THE VISIONARY!” — Pastor Furtick Coloring Book
brad/futuristguy wrote:
Maybe they’re counting on an appeal to The Trump?
Tit-for-Tat for delivering the Christianese vote?
brad/futuristguy wrote:
How long before church law enforcement and civil law enforcement clash?
GSD wrote:
And write tickets and impose fines for all sorts of “biblical” law infractions?
emily honey wrote:
Except, the sheer hypocrisy is disgraceful.
Note earlier recent TWW posts: alleged rapists as Conference Superstars? child abuse cover-uppers are Church Leaders?
Those who want their own Police Force do not even respect US law already in place.
In the proposed Christendom Police Force, Who is policing whom, and for what offenses or protection?
[This is why, with campus rape, victims have requested that cases be moved off campus to be investigated by municipal law enforcement, outside of the university’s own security/police force, so that the case would actually go through due process with integrity instead of cover-up.]
JeffT wrote:
To me, it’s a logical next step from Pastor/Dictator using actual local cops as his Enforcers. And/or Pastor making sure he’s on the right side of the Cop/Not-Cop divide.
Remember Bob Grenier, Calvary Chapel Visalia?
Remember ToJo and the “Code of Blue”?
Remember this? http://thewartburgwatch.com/2012/11/05/calvary-chapel-has-former-nba-player-arrested-for-speaking-out-against-ergun-caner/
Muslin, fka Dee Holmes wrote:
Not for lack of trying.
Remember the Guardian’s Office and RPF?
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Enforcing what and protecting whom?
Enforcing child abuse laws, protecting children, and holding perpetrators (possibly the church youth leader) accountable?
Nancy2 wrote:
“TITHE! TITHE! TITHE! TITHE! TITHE!”
Velour wrote:
State colleges (Cal State and UC systems) do.
California State University Police.
Jurisdiction limited to the State campus grounds only.
JYJames wrote:
The Will of GAWD channeled through Lead Pastor/Head Apostle, of course.
Including Spectral Evidence (“I SEE Things…”)
Nancy2 wrote:
They’d have to overcome the “Code of Blue”, where Cop will always side with Cop against Not-Cop. (Which might be a Feature — not Bug — of the church doing this in the first place.)
I’m confused why you quoted me in your comment, and what you are making an exception to in my comment?
JYJames wrote:
Bridget wrote:
Which can take us back to refighting the Reformation Wars.
“DID NOT!”
“DID SO!”
“DID NOT!”
“DID SO!”
…
“They will conduct their own investigations,” explained Rowe. “They will conduct their own security. They will make their own arrests”.
I can’t wrap my brain around the fact that a Representative would cite these facts as POSITIVES.
Kathi wrote:
Would Penn State cops dare raise hand against JoePa and The Sandusky?
Edward wrote:
The Representative is CHRISTIAN(TM)?
Culture War Without End, Hay-men.
Why a police department? Because obviously a police department has more authority in various matters – I would suspect this could involve arrests, use of deadly force, pursuit of lawbreakers off of the campus (who are running from the campus), etc. There could perhaps advantages regarding legal liability etc. Is there a knowledgeable lawyer who can speak to this (who is reading this)?
I agree this is potentially dangerous. Would that people understood how potently dangerous (and necessary) police use of force is in our society in general. People do not watch and monitor certain things enough in our society. Thank you Wartburg Watch
emily honey wrote:
Sorry. Except was the wrong word. Should be, “In addition…” or maybe, “Moreover”…
Thanks for your patience and understanding.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Good example.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Sigh. I’d like to believe that the Christian Dominionists are a tiny fringe, but they are gaining steam and lusting for power.
JYJames wrote:
Oh okay, just wondering, as I agree with your post.
Alabama readers of this Blog can do more than vent on this site. Contact your legislators in the Alabama House and Alabama senate. If you don’t know your senator or rep., use this helpful site: http://capwiz.com/state-al/home/ . You may have to give your address instead of your zip code. Make sure to click on the right “button” (and no I do not think you are not giving them enough info. to worry about Big Brother – the Alabama version of Big Brother is cash strapped anyway). A piece of advice, it could be good to pray for wisdom before you write, Email or call.
@ emily honey:
Thanks for calling the wrong word to my attention.
Yes, I agree with yours, also.
A correction: the post at 11:46 AM should read “”and no, I do not think you are giving them enough info.”
Oh, totally bizarre.
Edward wrote:
Exactly……… makes me wonder what kind of ugly stuff is and has been going on inside the church.
MidwesternEasterner wrote:
Hey, Constantine gave the Pope that land! See Donation of Constantine.
Nancy2 wrote:
Reminds me of how Jim Humble cited the Catholic sex abuse coverups as a positive. He basically argued that “you can get away with anything by registering as a church”. Including, in his case, telling people to literally drink bleach.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2010/sep/15/miracle-mineral-solutions-mms-bleach
@ Kathi:
The pastor arrests himself or not as he sees fit.
I haven’t made it through all of the comments, so maybe this has already been brought up.
http://www.al.com/opinion/index.ssf/2015/04/drug_bust_at_briarwood_christi.html
Not so long ago, state and local news outlets reported on some drug arrests at the school. Some felt that local law enforcement treated the situation differently (in terms of the information released to the public) than they might have if the same had happened at one of the local suburban or inner city public schools. It disturbs me that now they want their own police force.
@ L. Lee:
Great recommendation!
@ caroline:
Thanks! I came across some of that information while putting the post together.
The Briarwood Presbyterian Church Police bill is modeled after the Alabama statute authorizing private college police forces:
http://codes.findlaw.com/al/title-16-education/al-code-sect-16-22-1.html
“Alabama Code Title 16. Education. § 16-22-1
(a) The president or chief executive officer of any state college or university, the president or chief executive officer of the Alabama Institute for Deaf and Blind, the Presidents of Talladega College, Concordia College, Samford University, Birmingham-Southern College, Miles College, Stillman College, Tuskegee University, Spring Hill College, Faulkner University, and Selma University may appoint and employ one or more suitable persons to act as police officers…”
[click ‘next’ for Alabama Code Title 16. Education. § 16-22-2]
“Alabama Code Title 16. Education. § 16-22-2
(a) Any police officer appointed pursuant to the provisions of Section 16-47-10 or 16-22-1, is a peace officer whose authority extends to any place in the state; provided, that the primary duty of any such police or peace officer shall be the enforcement of the law on property owned or leased by the institution of higher education employing said peace officers…”
@ Deb:
It’s interesting that both the “drug bust” and the initial bill were in 2015.
No establishment clause violation was found in a case involving a similar statute in North Carolina, based on a finding that the college was not “predominantly religious.”
A Havard Law article explains:
http://harvardcrcl.org/delegation-of-police-power-to-religiously-affiliated-universities/
“Yencer…argued that North Carolina’s Campus Police Act, which authorizes the Attorney General to delegate police powers to private religious and secular universities, violated the Establishment Clause.”
“The trial court dismissed Yencer’s motion to suppress, and Yencer subsequently pled guilty, but reserved the right to appeal. The Court of Appeals reversed, holding that Davidson College was a religious institution for purposes of the Establishment Clause, and that Yencer’s arrest violated the First Amendment. On November 10, 2011, the Supreme Court of North Carolina reversed the decision of the Court of Appeals. The court found that Davidson College is not “predominantly religious,” and therefore that the Campus Police Act, as applied to Yencer’s conviction, did not run afoul of the Establishment Clause.”
“given the Supreme Court’s focus in Agostini on the character of the institutions benefited, one can only wonder whether a court would come to a different outcome in a case involving an institution whose purpose is more overtly religious in nature, such as a divinity school.”
@ Nancy2:
Spot on.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
The Office of Special Affairs. No change in mission — they still handle PR, legal affairs, espionage, and dirty tricks. Just a different coat of paint.
Velour wrote:
Mine did also. But I attended Florida State, which is a large campus with a large population. I think a lot depends on the size of the campus.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
I am unbiased, HUG. If I rant about abuses in Christianity, it will cover Protestantism and Catholicism and Evangelicalism . . .
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Not as long as their football team was winning!!
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
They don’t hold their own court, though, do they? They also get local police involved.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/college/ct-notre-dame-campus-reports-secret-20161116-story.html
“November 16, 2016
The Indiana Supreme Court says the University of Notre Dame can keep campus police reports secret.
The ruling Wednesday came in a lawsuit filed by ESPN seeking records about alleged crimes by student-athletes from the campus police department. The court’s unanimous ruling says the private university’s police department isn’t a public agency that falls under the state open records law.
That decision reverses a lower court ruling that the Notre Dame police department should be subject to public access laws because it has legal authority from the state to make arrests and has jurisdiction beyond the university’s campus.”
Altho the 2015 drug bust at Briarwood may have been the initiating reason for the special bill, I am wondering if resistance to racial diversity may also play a role. Does anyone know the racial makeup of the church? I noted the “whiteness” of the role models for Christian Manhood as pointed out in the link given earlier by Nancy2.
As far as California, I’ll note first that state universities and colleges are part of the government so police forces there are still government employees.
Two private colleges, Stanford and the University of the Pacific, have their own police force which are considered reserve officers of the respective county sheriffs’ departments (this was done by an understanding between the county and the university and may have been dicey legally). The law recently changed to make it official http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201520160AB2361 apparently so that the University of Southern California could have one. There are some restrictions. The university officers only has that power when on the job and it is limited in area.
Bridget wrote:
No, they police the campus, make arrests, process the arrestees through normal channels just like any other local police force. They are armed and equipped as per normal police.
My experience was with Cal State Fullerton and Cal Poly Pomona police in the mid-to-late Seventies. This was before school shooting/terrorism paranoia, so they mostly did traffic control and general first responder stuff. (Though there was a mass shooting at Cal State Fullerton Library in the mid-Seventies.) My actual experiences with them:
Fullerton: Police assistance after a car breakdown.
Fullerton: Visting D&D gamer brought a martial-arts blade weapon from his collection to show to the D&D club. Police held onto it, letting gamer recover it when he left the campus.
Fullerton (secondhand): D&D club said to have real good relations with the campus cops after fingering a petty arsonist torching trash cans in the hall where they met.
Pomona: Lotsa parking enforcement.
Pomona: First responder/accident investigation after my dorm roomie took a serious head injury in a pickup-game sports accident.
Erp wrote:
Affirmative.
California State University Police, jurisdiction limited to State college grounds and property.
Jerome wrote:
Keyword “Student-ATHLETES”.
Football justifies anything & everything — just ask Joe Pa and Jerry Sandusky.
Dew wrote:
“TOUCH NOT MINE ANOINTED! DO MY PROPHET NO HARM!”
Shauna wrote:
Yes you can Shauna. It’s an excellent point. When it’s hard enough as it is for municipal law enforcement to go after child sex abusers in religious organizations, this will be like ringing the dinner bell for predators.
Bridget wrote:
Many of the campuses in the Southeast with campus police forces also hold court on campus, often run by students. Victims have to request to move the jurisdiction off-campus, and often the university fights it in cases that might damage their reputation. This has caused a number of cover-ups in the past as university officials put pressure on the honor courts to keep victims quiet.
I posted an article earlier, but just do a Google search for “campus police not deal with rape” and a whole bunch of schools and incidents come up.
L. Lee wrote:
Re “use of deadly force”, I remember reading that to the Romans, nothing said “Authority” like the right to maim and kill under cover of Law.
Remember the Fasces, symbol of the Roman State? Rods for flogging bound around an axe for beheading.
Serving Kids In Japan wrote:
ChEKA changes its name to OGPU which changes its name to NKVD which changes its name to KGB…
nancyjane wrote:
AKA —
“SEGREGATION NOW, SEGREGATION FO-EVAH!”
— George C Wallace, Governor of Alabama in the Sixties & Seventies
?
Muff Potter wrote:
Feature, not Bug.
@ nancyjane:
The school was founded in the 1960s, possibly in reaction to the Civil Rights movement and desegregation. The same can be said of many “Christian” schools and academies in Alabama, although that does not necessarily reflect their current views. I do not know statistics, but the school and church are majority white, like the community in which they are located. Although I doubt that the major motivation here is racial, the idea of keeping “us” separate from “them” in a more general way likely plays a part.
ishy wrote:
You say “Southeast”, I say “Former Confederate States”.
Some radio hosts years ago reporting on some “News of the Weird” from the former CSA said “It’s like a different country down there.” Well, it WAS a different country for four years between 1861 & 1865.
Call the police, call the church, call the church police! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jA1kaFgLuh0
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
While they are common on campuses down here, searching reveals campuses all over the country who are guilty of the same thing.
John Calvin essentially had his own police force in Geneva. He was linked at the hip with the magistrate there. That’s why he and his followers were known as the magisterial reformers. Calvin’s vision was to have a Christian utopia in Geneva and he used the strong arm of the law to force his views on the populace. Calvin’s “police force” expelled, imprisoned, tortured and/or executed dissenters. I’m sure Briarwood won’t go to those extremes – they just want to protect the members … but I wonder if they would use their police to enforce shunning and excommunication?
Bridget wrote:
Your comment doesn’t make sense ….. try reading what I wrote again, and be more specific in your questioning …. the Vatican Swiss Guard has been in existence only for a portion of the two millenia that Christians have used the portion of Rome where the current Basilica of St. Peter is built over the Roman necropolis where St. Peter’s body was buried. The history of the Swiss Guard is interesting but it has not been a part of the Church for ‘the ages’, no. 🙂
Try being specific as to what was written. I don’t mind responding to your questions, Bridget, if they make sense.
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
Ah, the incisive wisdom of the Headless One. I’m a fan.
Edward wrote:
An autocratic leader sets out to investigate the source of revealing leaks. Yes, he WILL find out who is letting the cat out of the bag. He WILL! 🙂
Max wrote:
say whut?
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
If you are not familiar with the 11 nations theory of U. S. cultures you might find it interesting.
ishy wrote:
Well that is wrong!! I would move jurisdiction. . .
@ Christiane:
You could make sense of it if you wanted to. I was referring to the last three paragraphs.
Christiane wrote:
Bridget wrote:
Jerome wrote:
What happens there, stays there.
This is an interesting issue. Thanks Deb.
At first I thought Oh My Word, but on further reflection I am thinking that this idea just might catch on when some church is big enough and also has a school and a seminary, the school being the variable which impacted my thinking the most. After the problems that recently went on at the christian school where my g’kids go, and after the issues of both safety and culpability and in the light of the fact that no crime was committed so local law enforcement was not an option, I can see where an on site campus cop system would have been a real help for stabilizing the situation and allaying people’s safety concerns and for on-site investigation in the determination of just what all exactly had happened.
And please, this little Lutheran church and school is not a cult nor plotting the overthrow of the government, nor is the community college across the street from it a hotbed of chaos and anarchy. But I do see where campus cops are a good idea on university campuses and now that megaswithschools are big enough and are educational campuses, well, maybe. It might be worth thinking about.
@ Bridget:
@ Bridget:
The last three paragraphs? Were you referring to this?
“This place is more like a ‘cult’ or a ‘cult’ in progress which will get its way as long as it has political backing …. look at the influence of Doug Wilson’s cult in Moscow, Idaho….. we can see something in what has already played out in certain cults, yes
Honestly, in this day when our mentally ill have now been awarded gun rights, security IS important …. but in a cult, a private police force is at the service of them what runs the cult, and God help those who oppose the ‘leadership’.
Not good, but in the political climate we are now in, nothing surprises anymore.”
Once again, your comment did not make sense to me.
If you care to be specific, it would help me to understand you better and to respond respectfully.
May I also here defend our HUG who sees with enough clarity that in a few words, he manages to put up a mirror for us all to see ourselves? That is an invaluable service. I don’t mind being commented on by HUG …. he’s almost always ‘gets it’ with humor and wit that adds to the blog’s integrity. I AM a fan. I need our Headless to help me laugh at myself. Or I should become incorrigible indeed. 🙂
But at the end of the day, no matter one’s position, I can’t imagine how anyone with even the tiniest amount of education in Western philosophy and values could ever even entertain a notion like this.
Why does a church need a police force? What kind of “investigations” do they find themselves in need of doing that the real police cannot do?
Who are they accountable to? What oversight do they have? What recourse do those have who are treated unfairly by them?
Would they have access to records, documents, search capabilities that only law enforcement has?
Given the amount of corruption and self-interest that is common in churches, how could anyone think this would not end badly?
I can see nothing good coming out of this and a terrifying amount of bad.
@ okrapod:
Secondary schools, public and private, often have an officer assigned to the district or the building. The officer is on the local force. There are not separate entities or investigations.
As stated earlier, an issue with the higher ed campus police is that they work for the administration, not the community – students or citizens. See: The Hunting Ground. http://bit.ly/1MWr78w
With the track record of the church, in general, regarding law and law enforcement in the US, one cannot imagine a local church with an effective in-house self-contained police force.
@ Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist:
Hmmm. Then there is the question of permitting the university students to arm themselves and even offering a class for students to qualify to carry. I don’t know from western values, but this is going on,
During the ‘demonstrations’ in St. Louis when I was still a resident the hospital where I was advised us all to be armed even though there were on site cops. I will never forget getting called back to the hospital one night during all that. I had a four year old by one hand, a weapon in the other hand, and was terminally pregnant at the time. Given that sort of situation, one’s values change with the speed of light; I think it is biological or something.
ishy wrote:
It’s huge, scandals across the whole country. There is a conflict of interest; news that reflects badly on the college affects dollars coming in. Many times sports are involved and there’s the added problem of hurting the team if a member is held accountable. If colleges cannot maintain a neutral police force, who thinks that a church would?
@ JYJames:
I understand that. The school where RE works has that sort of arrangement. It is good for breaking up fights, and good if there has actually been what looks like crossing some legal line. But they are limited even at RE’s school. The school (a public high school) then has other disciplinary options. BTW they are called Resource Officers, and they are cops, but they would have been no help at all in the situation at the g’kids school, since nobody broke any law.
ishy wrote:
And just to mention one famous case, Jesse Matthew, who played football for Liberty U, who was accused of rape but not charged. He later went on to murder Morgan Harrington and Hannah Graham.
siteseer wrote:
Good question.
@ JYJames:
It is not the campus cops who are the crux of the problem, it is the university tribunals that look into the case and make decisions. Or so I read.
okrapod wrote:
True. Good point. The campus cops are not the problem.
However, if they are underlings of the administration & tribunals, and the tribunals are ineffectual – as you point out – it may not work having the campus police oversee campus law enforcement.
siteseer wrote:
more likely they will exist to block investigations, to root out the ‘leakers’ of who did what to whom, and to cover up for the big boss ….. I assume the ‘church’ would be paying the salaries of these cult warriors, unless of course the church can manage local politicians to make the local community pay the salaries ………. the cult cops are not going to be there to ‘protect’ anyone but them what pays them OR to follow any directives other than the mission laid out for them by the ‘leadership’
trust? laughable, and sadly so
but for people dumb enough to sign a ‘membership contract’, all manner of controls can be applied and these poor sheep will not ‘get it’ until one of their own precious lambs is being sacrificed
@ JYJames:
No doubt the system has its flaws, you got that right. IMO also the sports mystique has its flaws. I doubt there is a lot of person on person violence going on in chem lab or philosophy seminar.
okrapod wrote:
Some of those articles talk about how campus police either ignored reports completely, so they never even got to the honor courts, or they did very minimal investigations. So I think any time you have a police force beholden to an institution, and not to the public at large, you have a problem.
Most churches these days are struggling with what to do about security, regardless of size. I know of several in my area that have church members carrying concealed weapons during all services. We live in sad times.
In the early church, if you messed with God’s agenda, you died at the door (e.g., Ananias and Sapphira). Now, we have to pack heat to scare the devil off.
caroline wrote:
I just finished that article, it’s very interesting. This is the incident that apparently triggered this whole idea. I sense a lot of secrecy and spin from the school already, even without their own police force.
emily honey wrote:
“Hyper-authoritarian” captures the situation in the post.
Every time there is overreach in a church, the Bereans come to mind, with their eagerness AND scriptural research.
Acts 17: 11 “Now the Bereans were more noble-minded than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day …”
okrapod wrote:
Bull’s-eye. (LOL – we have a number of scientists in our circle. Not an exciting group, but good people.)
You mention athlete mystique; how about celebrity church leadership?
JYJames wrote:
I have no personal experience with abusive church leadership, but in my pursuit of education I did spend one year as a school nurse at a college and in that capacity say a glimpse (all the glimpse I wanted to see) of the athletes and the athletic department. So, I need to refrain from criticizing what I have not actually seen and restrict myself to what I have seen.
emily honey wrote:
I bet a lot of these guys will eventually decide Christianity isn’t authoritarian enough for them and move onto something else, like starting their own cults. The guy who started the “Mikraite” movement (Google it) is one of them. He’s also a narcissist who worships his own high IQ and holds a lot of other batty beliefs.
Max wrote:
as the psalm tells us, ‘Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the LORD keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain’
@ caroline:
Rich kids being forced to go to an evangelical high school would rather light up some doobies? I’m SHOCKED
People at a “gospel-centered” and “healthy” church go absolutely mental when the Stepford church veneer gets exposed? I’m SHOCKED
Max wrote:
Yes, and it is not just churches. I see ‘personal responsibility for security’ in various places.
What our church did was increase the number of hired off duty cops from one to two during services. Then we set up a room, open 24 hours, for the cops. Any cop, not just those we pay. They can stop by, help themselves to free snacks, avail themselves of the recliners, and just have a coffee break.
The reason we do this for the cops and for the homeless shelter and for the burial of the babies and for the moravian mission and why we partner with a small and poor church in Puerto Rico is because we don’t do any community or missions outreach or anything and therefore should have any and all tax advantage taken away from the church. (Sarcasm, needless to say.)
caroline wrote:
It’s hard to say whether drug arrests of students from a different kind of school would have been covered differently in the media. There are very strong laws about confidentiality regarding minors in schools.
Overall I think confidentiality is helpful. Kids do a lot of bone-headed things. Naming them promotes scapegoating. Confidentiality allows parents to work with the youngster and the school, police, courts, and counselors, without constant shaming.
In our school district, in recent years, several teens committed suicide after their entanglements with school authorities or police (who often work inside the schools) became public. The suicide of a teen has a terrible effect on a school.
okrapod wrote:
Great missions! Sounds like a church doing what it is supposed to! I’ve always felt it is better for church folks to be engaged directly in such outreach, rather than to send a check to a denominational entity to do their missions for them. There is room for both, but local churches really need to be more involved with the Great Commission, with hands-on faith in action where they can see needs being met in Jesus’ name.
Deb wrote:
It’s important to note the difference between law enforcement at high schools and at colleges. The laws covering high school kids are very different.
Example: In our school district, an 18-year-old living with a parent or guardian cannot leave the school building without permission from parent or school authorities. This is for safety.
People keep talking about Penn State, but Briarwood is a church and a private high school, right?
okrapod wrote:
Good distinction. In general, I think it’s helpful that schools with resource officers have broad choices for disciplining kids. They can handle things through administrative discipline (detention, etc.), through the courts, or both.
This often leads to more discipline rather than less.
@ okrapod:
I’m afraid I don’t understand the connection between your comment and mine. The idea that a religious institution is to have its own precinct flies in the face of Western democratic principles. The sword has been separated from the state since the Reformation(ish), and for good reason.
@ Friend:
I completely agree with your comment re: confidentiality for minors. I agree, too, that we can’t really know how it would have been handled at another school. I can only tell you, anecdotally, that when I lived in Birmingham, it was not uncommon to hear news reports of four unnamed minors arrested on drug-related charges at local high school, or XX amount of some drug seized at local high school, or similar. I hope that Briarwood officials wanted to keep things quiet purely out of concern for the offending juveniles, but I am cynical enough to believe that they realized that maintaining a distinction between themselves and the hell-bound public school crowd was good for enrollment and $$$.
@ Christiane:
It’s obvious you don’t get it. Forget about it. And there is certainly no need to defend HUG from me.
caroline wrote:
and I always thought that the rise in ‘Christian’ schools was a reaction to integration, or so I had been led to believe
@ Bridget:
No, I didn’t ‘get it’. If ‘it’ is phrased the way that you have done, I could have ASSUMED that which I do not want to assume about your intention, but I did not do that. I asked for clarification. Surely, I can’t be faulted for that?
As for HUG, I will speak for him as a bringer of light (and wit, and humor) into areas where it is always better to light a candle than to curse the darkness. Like I said, I’m a fan.
I will defend his right to see through my nonsense any time, and lance it with his succinctly appropo observations, and make me smile at the same time. 🙂
@ okrapod:
Sounds like a cool church.
Alabama’s law dealing with University police can be read at http://codes.findlaw.com/al/title-16-education/al-code-sect-16-22-1.html It seems much less apparent clear who Alabama’s police (with full authority) at private colleges answer to (in California it is clearly the Sheriff’s office). I looked up the Stanford University agreement with the county sheriff’s department http://sccgov.iqm2.com/Citizens/FileOpen.aspx?Type=4&ID=48994 I note in particular that the sheriff has to approve each hire of a reserve deputy by the university and can also strip the reserve deputy status from any. There also seem to be other safeguards, in particular in regards to record keeping. I don’t for instance see the church be willing to pay to the county for the salaries (or parts of salaries) of two county employees who keep an eye on things (at Stanford that would be the captain and records clerk mentioned on pages 7 and 8).
I also did a check on training requirements. Alabama has a requirement of 480 hours of training while California requires 664 hours of training.
@ NJ:
I was wondering the same thing myself, that’s like 10 events per day? Maybe they are counting classes at their school?
While I think the church shooting was very tragic, logically the chances of getting shot in church are infinitesimal. You are much more likely to be killed in a car accident on the way to church. Will the church buy a fleet of buses to provide safer transportation to all members?
Priscilla wrote:
I am thinking possible liability of some sort if something happens on the church campus.
caroline wrote:
Where I live, the high school of a minor involved in a crime is not usually named in the news. If something serious happens (like a creepy guy trying to lure kids into his vehicle), the school is named.
Christiane wrote:
I can’t help but take this one personally. We moved our two children from a public school because one was being bullied by other kids and school officials turned a blind eye and the other began to hate going. Putting them in a different environment was the best decision we ever made. I can speak for the motives of many other people who made the same decision and the implication of racism is offensive.
Todd Wilhelm wrote:
But your own police force could claim jurisdiction.
Very handy for dealing with dissenters, and keeping prying eyes out.
Also the Berlin Wall wasn’t built to keep people out.
@ Jack:
I’d give this church a very wide berth.
Bill M wrote:
Hi BILL M
I was in Norfolk VA when they closed the schools rather than integrate …. a friend, at the time named Kathryn Harris, was one of the students (white) involved in one court battle to get the schools re-opened (her family were Quakers and so they were very socially responsible people). Perhaps you have heard of the trouble in Norfolk? It was in the fifties, so maybe not. Of the young black students who finally did enter into school when they reopened (known as the Norfolk 17), some terrible things happened. They were abused, one girl was stabbed, and it went on for months and years. My friend Kathryn told me from her point of view what she saw also.
I am sorry if you are offended. I had learned about the ‘rise’ of Christian schools because of that reason during that time. I believe it happened even with Jerry Falwell, that he founded a Christian academy that was for white students only at that terrible time.
I am not against Christian schools, no …. my own children went to St. Catherine’s in Ringwood NJ. My daughter never set foot in a public school. The public schools near us at the time were brutal … I know, because I substitute taught for them and took a good look and said ‘not my kids, no way’, so I know what you must have gone through.
Good parents will do anything to help their children, and my parents sacrificed for myself and my siblings and my husband and I did the same for our children.
But the truth about what happened in Virginia is not pretty. And not all of the ‘schools’ that opened to white-only children were ‘Christian’, of course not. But we saw too much, I guess, when I was young, and I stand witness to some of it.
I’m sorry. That was a long time ago. Today, people have serious other reasons for seeking private and parochial alternatives for their little ones. You were right to be offended, I suppose. I spoke of a long time ago.
Christiane wrote:
I understood your point, Christiane. That for many whites the rise of private Christian schools was to avoid integration. I agree. I went to public school in California and remember many white parents were worried about busing and integration.
The fact that some public schools have serious problems and aren’t safe for children necessitating the move to private schools, doesn’t change the fact that many private schools were founded for racially-based reasons.
Deb wrote:
I feel like I’m having a KKK vision. Take a look at this 2015 Bill from MS. At first glance it may seem unrelated beyond the time-frame. Around line 600+ the language get’s weird. Felt strange to have no mention of pickups, rope or bedsheets.
http://billstatus.ls.state.ms.us/documents/2016/pdf/HB/0700-0799/HB0786PS.pdf
Todd Wilhelm wrote:
I think you are correct. See the post above with the link.
Priscilla wrote:
Another thing is that the church shooting in Charleston was motivated by racial animus (it targeted a black AME church with historical significance going back to the 1800s). Most attacks on houses of worship in the US are motivated by anti-minority sentiment (toward either an ethnic minority or a minority religion). That wouldn’t be a factor in the case of Briarwood (which is Protestant and, I presume, majority-white). We don’t really have a tradition of atheists or Satanists targeting congregations simply for being Christian (Varg Vikernes has few fans here).
Just some reading I was doing John MacArthur and his ilk truly have some rather dangerous ideas in my opinion. Especially concerning mental health issues, women issues, science in general, environmental issues…. One other thing he sure makes a lot of money.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Imagine Creflo Dollar having his own police force! Then he could get away with actually killing his parishioners for not tithing. In case any of you have never heard it, here is a link to one of Dollar’s sermons on shooting non-tithers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLsDNxZcOa8
brian wrote:
Spot on.
Edward wrote:
A large swath of American Christianity is under a delusional spell.
Edward wrote:
Hmmm….I think the Dominionists, i.e. – Reconstructionists, are just beginning to come out of the woodwork in increasing numbers. If this legislation is passed, the Reconstuctionist Movement could become quite popular within evangelicalism. The worst kind of brutality is that which has been given a theological veneer.
Dew wrote:
That document has since been proven to be a forgery. Read this link.
http://www.christian-history.org/donation-of-constantine.html
brian wrote:
Brian, and most of all, “doctrinal.” Best to avoid that lot altogether.
Velour wrote:
That did happen, and I believe the motives were mixed. I think that for some whites it was in part to avoid the violence which accompanied integration in many places.
The only two catholic schools in our town were established during that period, one in 1953 and one in 1954, and one variable may have been anticipation of the violence resulting from Brown v Board of Education (argued in 1952 and decided in 1954). Incidentally, one of those catholic schools says that it was established because of an influx of people from the north who were here for jobs. So, north vs south may also have played a part locally. Perhaps the yankees wanted nothing to do with us and our now integrated schools, for whatever reason.
But also the two baptist schools from that era were founded between 1950 and 1954. So, how could we ever know who among those had which motives? But I do want to say this, when pots start judging kettles from decades ago perhaps the current issue is not just schools but also religious bias. Surely not. Who would ever judge others in that manner?
Personally, I was alive during that era. I graduated high school in 1952. I have no criticisms for anybody who created safe places for their children regardless of whether their reasons were religion or safety or groundless fear; or even if it contained an element of north vs south or even catholic vs protestant. The children should not have to bear the brunt of the adult’s issues.
Darlene wrote:
That attitude of wanting one’s own religious group to be in charge of as much of society as possible goes way back in christianity, before the great schism and before the reformation. It has never gone away; it has only been kept at bay in some places and at some times. It has caused oceans of trouble and still does. The idea is ‘God went away and left me in charge of you’. Ummm. NO.
okrapod wrote:
It is nice, however, that we have evolved (and are still evolving) so that children of all backgrounds can get an education together.
A little boy (a neighbor’s son) and I were talking about Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.
He is in the first grade. He is of Asian descent and his dark-skinned. I gently told him that dark children and light children weren’t permitted to mix in school like they are now. He was shocked!
There is a dangerous combination of focusing on politics and a puritanical spirit that is pervasive in Pastor Reeder’s ministry. I attempted to speak to him about this problem back in 1998. Check out the focus of his blog. ISIS, women in combat, Trump and the pope, how to vote, problems with the Boy Scouts, Refugee crisis, Real State of the Union, Same sex marriage, Chris Christie (at least “Christie” includes “Christ”), the Culture of Death, etc.etc.
Combine this with a laser focus on sanctification and you have, in my opinion, a toxic brew.
@ okrapod:
In my city as long as I can remember there have been many Catholic schools. There were probably 20 or so within the county when I was a kid. Back then, You had to be Catholic to attend. When busing was implemented in the 70’s that rule was changed and they grew even more consolidating some schools and many became the schools for elites. Right now, off the top of my head, I can name off 5 expensive elite Catholic high schools.
Our district is huge and busing since the 70’s to allocate population percentages in each school means many children are on a school bus 3-4 hours per day going across county. That means unless mom can pick you up, no after school activities. It is especially hard on sports programs that do provide buses after school but not to games. Kids who could walk to school are spending hours daily on buses. Now the buses are a huge disciplinary issue and they can’t ever find enough drivers so constant delays are a huge problem.
The big issue here is time on the school bus, daily. Those who could afford it when busing started moved out of county. More secular and religious private schools sprang up, too.
The irony of this issue all these years later (busing still exists in a clever renaming of “clusters” after the Supreme Court verdict back around 2007) is that 7 African American pastors here are pummeling the governor (in a good way) about charter schools. They are demanding that things have to change and they see public schools as they are now as the worst alternative for those they represent.
Some could say it was racist not to want your kid on a bus for 3 hours per day across the county. Well, actually many did call it racist. That is how it works. That is how social engineering works. You shame people and insult them in order to micromanage their lives and make them good people according to the current definition of good. . There are few parents of any ethnic or origin, who want their kids shuffled around that way. Yet, it was the wealthy who put their kids in private Catholic schools within the county because they don’t do scholarships for poor people in house as some of the other private schools do.
When the national school choice people came around with scholarships and grants, there were tons of poor working class African Americans applying. I had no idea how deep the issue went until I saw those lines.
Things are often not what they seem or how the headlines proclaim them.
Lydia wrote:
I don’t live in your area of the nation with such hours-long daily busing schedules for children to and from school.
I will say, however, that having been in elementary school in the 70’s when busing was taking place in my California community I appreciate the value of it. Why should black children from the “other side of the tracks” be consigned to second-rate or third-rate schools based on their color.
Our public tax dollars paid for our schools and they were as entitled to a quality education as any child in our community.
Velour wrote:
I don’t know about California, but where I lived in Kentucky he would have gone to the white school as would Latinos and others. The issue was not skin color but rather whether or not one had African ancestry. And there were formulas to figure out what percentage African somebody was. If you were defined as African you went to the black school even if you were white enough to ‘pass’. And if you were darker in skin color but not African you went to the white school.
Here is a link about how that would have been in Alabama in 1950.
https://www.quora.com/Civil-Rights-If-I-were-an-Asian-kid-in-the-1950s-living-in-Alabama-what-school-would-I-go-to
@ Velour:
Not sure why kids have to be bused to receive quality education. It would be done everywhere, I suppose, if it worked so well. Forty years later, the quality of education is worse and racial divisiveness worse. The social experiment did not improve either. The money allocated is in the same district and allocated fairly. I realize you may think saying that is racist. Talk to the African American pastors I mentioned about that. Personally, I was raised to believe we are to look at on content of character and not color of skin or origin. evidently that is racist now. My first Sunday School teacher must be spinning in her grave. She just happened to be AA.
And I find it especially strange that some don’t know that there are many AA’s living on the right side of the tracks (to paraphrase you) or others who are not AA living on the wrong side. The ‘us vs them’ mentality has been very unfortunate and keeps many in bad situations while the social engineers keep moving on up. That is a result of group thinking instead of seeing individuals. But many benefit from it.
What cracks me up even more is the social engineer elites put their kids in private schools.
Lydia wrote:
Yes, and it was those kids who got thrown in our face by the public school as the coming dreaded competition (catholic schools went through 8th grade only) who were going to make all of us ashamed of our pitiful level of achievement as soon as we all got to high school–or something. So I took an extra language in high school (Latin) so that the catholic kids did not get ahead of me. But here is the thing, we learned the pronunciation of Latin from the classical period and they learned the later pronunciation which is now called ecclesiastical Latin. And our church is increasingly prone to lapse into a wee bit of ecclesiastical Latin on occasion.
Arrgh. They knew something I did not. But then, I knew something that they did not. But wait. Today we start Latin class at St. Ts in which some of us are going to add ecclesiastical latin pronunciation to our residual meager memories from long ago. So I comfort myself that they are still not getting ahead of me because I will too will know 47 ways from Sunday as to when the letter g is pronounced which way, or not. Har hardee har har. Nah Nanny Boo Boo.
A little competition never hurt anybody.
@ Lydia:
The town where I lived for a while in the Tidewater area of NC solved the busing issue by simply shutting down all the blacks schools and putting all the kids in the white schools. This caused a lot of unemployment among the black former teachers, and frankly was a blow to the local black middle class, but the law is the law, and some way had to be found to comply. As far as I know there were no incidents.
@ okrapod:
In the 60’s, I attended public elementary school with African Americans in Louisville. My much older brother attended attended public schools with African Americans. His BFF from HS football days (grad 1963) is AA and still is.
@ okrapod:
Ecclesiastical Latin is the pronunciation in most classical music so I had that much in addition to HS Latin. :o) Some of my HS friends parents wanted to use the threat of an all girls Catholic school if they did not straighten up until they found out they had to go through the arduous conversion and pay the parish so much every year. That changed with busing. Now some are very elite and the big Catholic family with all the kids at the school, a memory of times past. They can’t afford it, either, even with only a few kids.
The amusing not so secret, secret here are the large percentages of public school teachers whose kids are in private schools. The ones that aren’t are in the better magnet schools where you have to have the grades and work hard to get in and they also approach entrance with population percentages. And the private schools pay teachers much less than public schools. So that is a conundrum when it comes to what makes for quality education and how.
As to Briarwood, many mega churches courted law enforcement long ago. The thinking was anytime you have a lot of people in a concentrated area you need security. Many off duty police hired and paid well to direct traffic and some in plain clothes to perform sort of bodyguard type duties for the ministry elites on the weekends. This spilled over into plain clothes planted around the arena (sanctuary) to quell or prevent potential problems. These relationships grew into proportions that make me extremely uncomfortable. Here, one big very popular mega church pastor has a son who is the media spokesman for the metro police. That relationship started when the son was very young. Can you imagine trying to report a sexual molestation by a ministry person to the authorities in these situations?
The concept of private security is everywhere. Big companies, colleges, etc. And they often have very close relationships with law enforcement. I think it is going to get worse. In a day and time some want to burn your business down or obstruct entrances because they disagree and that is considered “free speech”, people are going to take drastic measures for security.
As to churches, especially Calvinist ones like Briarwood, I have to ask, Isn’t God in control of whatever happens?
Lydia wrote:
That is exactly what my great-uncle’s family did. Uncle moved to Louisville when he married for a decent job. Had 4 children, 3 of whom were still in school when busing started. My cousin’s daily bus rides went from 10 minutes each way to a little over 3 hours each way. They had to get on the bus at 4:30 am, older daughter could no longer play in the school band, etc. My cousins ranged in age from 8 to 20 when uncle decided to come back to Todd county. The family wasn’t rich, by any means. Uncle had enough time and skill in where he worked to take early retirement, move back home and open his own small home based business, servicing heat and air units.
@ Velour:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/09/families-flee-san-francisco_n_1335639.html
Oddly enough there is apparently one American church that already has a police force, the Protestant Episcopal Cathedral Foundation in Washington, DC (generally known as the National Cathedral but also includes several schools) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_National_Cathedral_Police I’ve not yet figured out whether this was done directly by the federal government or by the District of Columbia.
@ Lydia:
I graduated high school in 1952. When I got to U of L in that fall the school had already shut down Municipal College (the black college) and integrated Belknap campus a year or two before. I don’t remember race being much of an issue until a few years later. A larger issue was concern that so many females had listed as pre-med. They even had us all at a meeting about the wisdom or lack of it for that to be the case.
@ Nancy2:
There are thousands such stories from all quarters. Frankly, my mom was pro busing at the time. One thinks in the time and situation such social engineering programs are for the greater good without being able to see the long term ramifications of micromanaging lives.. The AA students in my school before busing had the hardest time of any when it started. Some of them very popular (one guy was best all around senior favorite, cheerleaders, etc.) but were subjected to a lot of Uncle Tom type sneers. The students bused in did not want to be bused, either. And my school was already weighted toward population stats so not that many bused in or out.
@ okrapod:
I don’t doubt it! My mom knew a few female doctors but they were all missionaries. I don’t know where they attended medical school, though. I was too young to ask such questions. Evidently, back then it was ok for females to doctor if foreign males in third world countries. :o)
We are so blessed times have changed for women in the professions. Call me out on inequality but I prefer female doctors for certain things. My female OB with 4 kids kept telling me they don’t come with manuals. :o)
Nancy2 wrote:
We did something similar but it was St. Louis by then. He and I with two pre-schoolers looked at the situation and ‘ran the ad’ eventually choosing a small town in a rural county of Tidewater NC because we said we are not going to live like this. I left a job to die for (med school clinical faculty) to make that move. I do not regret it.
@ Erp:
I am speechless. Who would ever have thought that the episcopalians constituted such a threat to law and order? You just never know any more.
Lydia wrote:
They love to say that, but by their actions to do not trust GOD IMO. By their actions they wish to be gods.
Lydia wrote:
This is what I was likely reacting to last night. The growth of private and religious schools is across the country and transcends busing or race. It is also no longer a choice of “the wealthy”. Something is going on that middle and even lower income people will forgo the free public schools to pay for the service elsewhere. It should be a huge question mark for public schools that have much greater resources.
Instead those who choose private schools are labeled racist or elitist and those who home school are closet abusers. We are in a culture that is driven by a media that is increasingly hostile to the concerns of much of the country and is is difficult to separate the propaganda from the conventional wisdom.
@ Bill M:
Hold on to your hat. Our public school system is now starting specific race based and gender separated schools for middle schoolers. Forty years of integrated busing brought us specific race based segregated schools. Go figure.
Bill M wrote:
Bill: I am curious as to what media you are referencing in your statement?
A lot of parents send their children to private school to keep their kids away from drugs, partying, troubled kids who would be a bad influence, etc. If the news gets out that the kids in the private school are also involved in drugs, does that affect the perceived value of the private school? Does it affect the number of registrations, does it affect the bottom line of the school? If the school has its own police force, can it keep such incidents private and maintain the perception that the private school is free of the problems that beguile the public school.
There have been a lot of incidents of sex abuse in private schools in the news the last few years. I think we’ve reached a tipping point where things traditionally kept secret are coming out in the open. This, again, is something that could strongly affect perceptions and enrollments. Would a private police force keep this kind of thing under cover? And how would they actually handle a situation of sex abuse? Would the perpetrator be arrested and charged? Would the authorities seek out all the victims and ensure they were cared for? Or would the perpetrators quietly slip away in the night?
I’m assuming if someone is arrested, charged, taken to trial, at some point that becomes a news item available to the public?
@ siteseer:
Oh there are drugs in private high schools, for sure. We have a huge heroin epidemic here that crosses all social economic lines. As to the other, several incidents have surfaced and there were convictions as they are not immune. But the culture of secrecy is also in public school administration. It took years and years for the public school system here to be caught with an “inside” reporting system of the bad stuff while they “complied” with the mandatory “outside” system that went to state government, very carefully. The difference of incidents were in the thousands kept from state government. But there are no punishments for the folks who implemented these things. So, there is a trust problem everywhere. And, local law enforcement is in almost every public school so the disconnect is really big. Everyone wants to report the good numbers and keep the bad stuff from the paying public.
Lydia wrote:
Our experiences only apply to our communities.
I will say that busing did improve racial equality and the educational aspirations of black children in my Northern California community.
I appreciate the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Brown v. Board of Education and that “separate but equal” schools based on race violated the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
The issue was not social engineering, it was a constitutional issue.
In the case of my family (most were educators at all levels: elementary, junior high, high school, community college, and university) they valued a good education for all children (including of color) and we (white) children stayed in public schools. My family practiced what they preached about education.
For Lydia,
The U.S. Supreme Court case: https://www.oyez.org/cases/1940-1955/347us483
siteseer wrote:
I have taught in public school systems; and in a small, private Christian school. The only notable difference between the two is class size. The smaller class size in a private school is easier to manage.
But……… There are parents who enroll their kids in private schools simply because the kids stay in so much trouble in the public schools. There is also a number of pampered, spoiled brats in private schools. Both the pampered pets and their parents expect staff to just let certain things slide. Private schools are good, better than public IMO, but they are not all they are cracked up to be.
@ Lydia
I too believe that the grand social engineering schemes (busing in particular) concocted by Washington bureaucrats have been abysmal failures.
I also believe that responsible and forward thinking parents of any race want their kids to obtain a high quality education and that this desire has absolutely nothing to do with the racial makeup of the schools their children attend.
@ Velour:
Is it true that you all have a secession movement going? Why would you do that if all things are working out well for CA? I know why the south did it, but why you all? I am not trying to be ugly, I just read rumors of disquiet and I don’t know what is going on.
One other question. When all this went down in CA what was your demographic as to percentage of white, latino, black, asian and other? I am thinking population distribution may have played a role in how people responded to certain things.
And lastly, based on your age (which I am not asking) did you experience any of the turmoil of the times personally?
My phone has somehow been blocked as spam on this site so switching to husband’s phone
Anyways, this is a terrible idea. Churches cannot be trusted with this. They can’t even police themselves and hold themselves accountable for anything.
I found out last night that my 86 year old grandmother was handled, fondled and kissed while playing the organ at church a couple of weeks ago. She just now got the courage to confess to my mom. The church told her the man meant it innocently. I am now mentally a “done.”
Muff Potter wrote:
Yes!Yes! Yes! The working poor are the ones hit hardest! We can start with math curricula for crying out loud. Parents are scraping pennies to send their kids to Kumon after school.
I am so weary of certain groups of kids being pegged as problems by the social engineers with low expectations before they even enter School.
@ Velour:
? Not sure what I should clean from this. Do you honestly think I don’t believe in equal education? Our county has one district with one tax base allocated for public education. That was not the issue for busing back in the 70’s. Now the school district is going backwards and actually implementing race based schools.
Nancy2 wrote:
Hi Nancy Two,
I also have taught in private, and in parochial, and in public schools. The class size in my last Catholic school year was sixteen. The class sizes in my last public school year was thirty-five, working with a special ed teacher, including students with learning disabilities and ESL students together with ‘regular’ students.
The main difference I noted was the ‘rigor’ with which the Catholic schools provided intense basic skills training, concentrating in math and reading heavily. Talk about ‘no one left behind’: I tutored BEFORE school. I tutored AFTER school…… if there were any who had trouble, they were given tutoring. The nuns did not play. No political ‘agendas’ like the public school where we had to teach fairly complex economic theories to sixth graders who struggled with reading skills ….. that was interesting, and heart-breaking as whoever had incorporated their pet economic theories into the curriculum obviously had no comprehension of the inability of some sixth grade children to yet fully grasp abstract concepts. We did our best. I gave those curriculum designers an F minus. 🙂
Is Catholic education ‘for the rich’? Well, my great French Canadian great grandparents were educated by nuns, my grandparents, my father, myself, my children …….
my father tells of how my grandfather did carpentry work for the priests and nuns to help pay for the schooling, and how my Memere (grandmother) sewed and scrubbed for the nuns (my father remembers her hands were chapped and bled sometimes).
For the rich???? No. But sacrifices were made, yes. My own father worked three jobs at one time….. if we were a ‘privileged’ family at all to receive Catholic education, I think it was in work ethic and determination …. and that strength WAS generational, going back as far as the family remembered in its days in Canada.
@ Christiane:
Typical tuition for Catholic school here is 13-14 thousand per year. Books and school fees not included. And they are some of the best schools in the county.
@ Lydia:
When my daughter was of high school age, we had two levels of Catholic education to choose from: the regional Catholic High School and a smaller Catholic prep school with small class sizes …. we opted for the smaller class sizes and she was very happy there, participating in sports and taking advantage of the travel programs where her French teacher took students over to Europe in the summertime. My husband made a good salary, but I helped with the tuition by substitute teaching when my son was well enough to attend his day program. It never occurred to us to reckon the costs as a reason for her not to attend. And living in northern Jersey was not cheap.
Velour wrote:
I was in Junior High in a major Midwest city during bussing. The children bussed to inner cities and the children bussed to the suberbs hated it.
Christiane wrote:
The private Christian school I taught at was an eclectic mix; baptists and our variations, Methodists, Catholic, Nazarene, Presbies, etc. I tutored, too. The one thing I absolutely adored about that school: if 1/3 of a class was functioning below grade level, admin supported forgetting the pre-determined core curriculum for a while and getting the kids up to speed – my kinda teachin’!
@ Muff Potter:
My liberal brethren and my progressive sisters would have me run out of town on a rail for that one. That’s the price of being a free-thinker and in lockstep with none.
@ Christiane:
The working poor have few options. I am glad it worked for you. They most likely had an excellent education. I can list 5 Catholic schools I would have loved for my kids to have attended but the tuition was about 5-7 grand more per year than other private schools. One thing besides excellent academics is their focus on the arts and partnering with the city and arts foundations. A big failing in almost all but one public schools here and a huge pet peeves of mine. We are very involved with arts and are in and out of Catholic schools/churches here all the time who host many events. The Cathedrals often have the best acoustics, too. The Arts are excellent outlets for the kids who don’t do sports.
@ Lydia:
I can say that those who sacrifice to educate their children privately are no strangers to economy ….. consignment stores and thrift shops and garage sales and estate sales are the norm, not exception; cheaper cuts of meat challenge cooking skills, yes, but no one notices if the meal is well-prepared with care; libraries instead of book stores; farmers’ markets and dairies instead of supermarkets; and ‘use it up and wear it out’, is honored for its practicality. Living simply makes a difference, and if that difference is a service to a child’s future, then I would say it was worth it.
I wonder: if people sit down today and calculate just how much INTEREST they are paying on what they owe ….. they would find it amounts to more than the cost of a parochial education, yes.
Our values and priorities determine the way we live, not the reverse. Or at least, that is the ‘better way’, is it not?
@ Christiane:
When people make 25-30 grand a year working 2 jobs because they were laid off no economies are going to afford private schools. It all goes to survival. I think we have beat on people enough.
@ Christiane:
And how would that work for a working class single mom?
Lydia wrote:
It’s worse than that. Systems are postponing buying new textbooks because of “budget shortfalls”, when the books are ten years old and torn to pieces. Basketball, football, and baseball come first. I have had athletes tell me, “You have to give me a passing grade because …….”. I have had parents, coaches, and athletic directors come to me and try to get me to give a free passing grade athletes who had done zero class work for the grading period (when I passed out tests they threw them in the trash can) – if they’d just sweep the classroom floor each day for a week. No way. If the athletes refuse to do anything in class, they can fail the grade and sit on the bench the following year, for all I care!
I have tutored professionally in extended school services (ESS); two days per week, 1 hour each day. I was the only math teacher budgeted to do ESS, so I had 20 to 25 students all lumped together from all math courses (basic math, consumer math, pre-algebra, algebra I and I, pre-cal) offered in every session.
@ Lydia:
Lydia, things are changing. When I was a girl, most of our teachers were nuns. When my daughter came along, many of her teachers were lay teachers ….. the nuns provided a chance for the Church to educated more children at less cost, yes.
Today, to attend the regional Catholic high school in our area is prohibitively too expensive for someone like the lady I get to do my hair once a year …. she wants to send her son but she is a single mother whose ex-husband does not contribute to his care, and not even her extended family can raise the monies needed. I understand these changes have come.
I hope for things to change back to the point where Catholic education was ‘the norm’ for a child of the faith, but I don’t see it happening unless there is a whole revamping of how it is to be paid for at today’s costs. Not good.
I keep close to me my father’s story of my Memere’s bleeding, chapped fingers when I think about what we gave up for our children. When you have that vivid of an example of sacrificing for the education of children as an inheritance, you owe something ‘forward’ was my belief. Sometimes things are pre-determined in families like mine.
Todd Wilhelm wrote:
But could Pastor be sure of their Loyalty?
Nancy2 wrote:
Bravo, good for you. That kind of pressure from coaches and parents is a betrayal of their children, not a help.
I know about this type of pressure. I didn’t cave either. I was called into ‘meetings’, but I didn’t cave, I just told the truth and had the documentation, as well as all the notes and phone call entries to try to get the children extra help after school ….. very few ever took advantage, and the parents didn’t care …..
in the end, for many of those kids, I may have been the only one who really cared …. and I think you also would have stood your ground against the pressure for the same reason.
Christiane wrote:
“First they came for the Jews, but I wasn’t a Jew…”
@ Christiane:
By whom?
MidwesternEasterner wrote:
Another example of “Intelligence 18, Wisdom 3, Charisma 18”?
@ Nancy2:
Good for you! And districts remain admin top heavy with high salaries. The PR/communication people in this public district make 5x more than a seasoned teacher. Teachers get the brunt of all the problems, imo.
Friend wrote:
I remember a LOT of “bone-headed things” from my 1960s-vintage grade school and early 1970s high school days. Some of the “bone-headed things” we did back then would have us up on hate crime or sexual harassment charges if done today.
Bart Simpson Syndrome: When you’re 12 years old and male, ANYTHING gross and/or disgusting is hilarious. Especially if it gets a panic reaction out of the grown-ups. (That’s the first thing I think of when I hear Breaking News headlines about swastikas or hangman’s nooses appearing at a school. About the latter, if you ever let one end of a rope dangle free in my school days, within 20 minutes SOME wag would tie a noose in it. Guaranteed.)
Christiane wrote:
That’s because we’re both ROMISH.
(You know, praying to dead people and Mary instead of Jesus?)
Lydia wrote:
LOL …. this happened to a friend in our neighborhood …. her mother found her canoodling with the wild neighbor boy who was an older teen in the famly’s garage, and before you could say ‘WTF’, my friend was packed off to Villa Marie Academy for Girls. I remember I used to ride with her mother to pick her up from the train station.
Did she ‘straighten up’? I don’t know, but her mother was not taking any chances. It costs them a fortune. Didn’t matter. Her mother paid.
Darlene wrote:
As one commenter at Homeschoolers Anonymous put it:
“Goodbye, United States of America.
Hello, Republic of Gilead.”
“Nothing’s worse than a monster who thinks he’s right with God.”
— Captain Mal “Tightpants” Reynolds, Free Trader Serenity
(Yes there is, Captain. A Monster who KNOWS He’s Right with God.)
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
And I hope you are free to pray to whomever you want and others are free to disagree. If no one is harmed in either endeavor or property damaged –what could be the problem?
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
a joyful inordinate illogical ability to laugh at ourselves ….. where does THAT come from 🙂 it wouldn’t be the same without the joy, would it???
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
I hear they are remaking ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ ….. I thought the original was pretty powerful …… maybe they are updating it
sign at the women’s march in D.C.
“Melania, blink twice if you want us to rescue you!”
okrapod wrote:
Did they use the formulas from slavery days?
Griffe = 3/4 black, 1/4 white
Mulatto = 1/2 black, 1/2 white (also used as a generic term for mixed-race)
Quadroon = 1/4 black, 3/4 white
Octoroon = 1/8 black, 7/8 white
Plus the one-drop rule, where ANY black ancestry at all = black.
But that’s not how far it’s gone in history:
The Nazis’ Blood Purity boys cut off Mischling (“mixture”) at 1/16 inferior blood (with classification based on whether the inferior blood came from the mother or father); 1/32 Untermensch, no problem.
But French-Colonial Haiti was the strictest, rating race on steps of 1/128 black. 1/128 more white bestowed race superiority over those 1/128 less. And after the Haitian Revolution, Negritude flipped the colors so 1/128 more BLACK bestowed race superiority.
okrapod wrote:
Which would have fanned a flame of Resentment and Hostility towards the Catholic school kids.
Lydia wrote:
Ever heard of Blackwater in Iraq?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academi
“Vive le Mort, Vive le Guerre, Vive le Sacre Mercenaire…”
okrapod wrote:
No, there isn’t a secession movement in California, except I guess among a few who might chatter about something so foolish after a night of drinking with their friends.
During busing in the 1970’s, my Northern California city was composed of:
85% whites
10% blacks
5% other: Native American, Asian, and a very small Hispanic population
I do remember that there were parents in our community that were upset about integration and there were many public meetings for parents at the school to explain it.
Our Northern California community, by the way (now considered “wine country”), was founded by men from The South who were slaveholders and lost the Civil War. Certainly their attitudes about blacks permeated our community.
I remember when the first buses rolled in to implement integration there was initial tension, in peoples’ families, in the classrooms, and on the playground. But we all got used to it within about three weeks and life went on.
I remember my parents buying a used sailboat trailer from a black classmate’s father in the poor side of town where blacks lived. I was surprised to find out that my classmate’s home had an outhouse and wasn’t plumbed for a bathroom and city sewage. I remember that being my first real shock about the difference between whites and blacks in our community.
Velour wrote:
must have been like when I was eight years old and we went through the Panama Canal and my father took us out to eat in Panama at a restaurant …. on the way, we saw children and a donkey and the children were dirty and in rags and I had never seen this before … not even shoes on their feet …
but it was their eyes …. you don’t forget, no
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
every hear of Blackwater training facility in NC/Virginia border area? reports of local mailboxes being used at night for target practice? no one could ever prove anything of course, but the locals suspected the worst …..
@ Christiane: Yes. These teenagers think they’re going to get a free ride through college and be big sports stars, make billions. They’re not as good at the sports as they think they are. They aren’t allowed play in college because of low grades and end up dropping out, dealing drugs……. then jail.
If a student was really trying, well behaved, and just a percentage point or two shy of making the grade, I would give it to them.
@ Lydia: The school district (Christan county) I worked in before I went to the private school change discipline rules 3 years ago. Minorities are now allowed to get away with more because of “cultural differences”. The BoE is now running ads in the paper for both full time school teachers and substitutes.
Christiane wrote:
Nah. Drunks in a pickup perhaps, but more likely teenagers having fun jerking people around. Blackwater would not have been the only people carrying ‘possibility’ around with them, not by a long ways. And Blackwater would not likely have taken that risk. People can be right silly sometimes.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/california-is-a-nation-not-a-state-a-fringe-movement-wants-a-break-from-the-us/2017/02/18/ed85671c-f567-11e6-8d72-263470bf0401_story.html?utm_term=.b8f834c0b183
Nancy2 wrote:
Good grief…… I remember saying to my co-worker of many years: “what this school needs is for five nuns to come in here and kick tail” ….. she agreed and we proceeded to reminisce about some of the nuns we had each known in our respective childhoods …..
‘discipline’ means just that: firm guidance and direction and an insistence on ‘applying yourself to task’ and ‘doing your best’ …. who has the patience for that kind of thing these days in places where poor children are ‘excused’?
that to me says more about the teachers not being up to the job than that the children are suffering from ‘cultural deprivation’ …..
no one should EVER discount a child in education, not for a minute, because if the teachers don’t care, who will?????
mot wrote:
It is off subject so I’ll comment over on the Open Discussion.
Nancy2 wrote:
that is reasonable, yes ….. effort deserves recognition when someone sets their face towards accomplishing ….. sometimes the accomplishment might be measured in smaller steps, but yes, that also means something worth celebrating 🙂
Velour wrote:
You and your area sound more prosperous than we were. We were close in rural but not actually in the city. At my house we did not have city water or city sewer but we did have indoor plumbing with a well and a septic tank. There were relatives on one side of the family who still used an outhouse and the only indoor water was a hand pump at the kitchen sink which pumped from the well. The elementary school where I was did not have indoor potty facilities for the elementary grades. There was a really big outhouse with a partition down the middle and girls on one side and boys on the other. There were something like 6 or 8 holes on each side. The elementary students were all in ‘portables’ which of course were not portable. And some of my classmates lived in houses heated with a Warm Morning Stove. I had no idea at the time that there was anything wrong with any of that.
Meanwhile at home my Dad tried to teach me how to think like a lawyer (he failed) how to speak a wee bit of German (not much progress there) and how to argue some points of theology from scripture (alas). My point being, life is not all about potties and some old coal furnace like we had. I know you did not even suggest that, I am just thinking out loud.
I did not care about the potties, never thought about it in fact. But I was determined to mop the academic floor with the first catholic kid I could find after all that harassment from teachers about how great the catholic schools were.
@ okrapod:
LOL …. I can picture this!
okrapod wrote:
LOL!
@ Velour:
too funny! 🙂
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Yes. You could say that. So I understand how people can oppose and resent the whole private or religious school idea.
Is nothing safe? I am at an Episcopalian church for a recital. Big picture poster in narnex: An Evening with AL Mohler.
Sigh
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Yes, nooses and swastikas definitely get teens into hot water now. But they are warned in advance not to do those things; I was never specifically warned against this.
My impression of our local teens is that they now put the shocking/rude stuff on private social media, often with a link that has a content warning. For the most part this is their idea of humor or pop culture, rather than extremist or criminal content.
Their public social media, and actual activities, tend to be more acceptable. School administrators patrol this stuff aggressively. Participation policies for extracurricular activities include social media as part of personal conduct. This is mostly good… but it sometimes leads to, say, a swimmer getting reprimanded for posting on personal Twitter that the swim team is going to lose in tonight’s meet. School policies say that students are allowed to express their feelings,but they are not allowed to make disparaging comments. Lest you think this is political correctness gone wild, in practice it’s a crucial opportunity for teens to learn what they can and cannot say, and how they should react to a challenge by an authority figure. Good practice for the workplace.
okrapod wrote:
I wonder if that might have been an additional Feature (not Bug) on behalf of the public school administrators & faculty?
Friend wrote:
Like I said above, Bart Simpson Syndrome.
Lydia wrote:
No worries. It’s a sign that you’re about to be raptured out of there.
In all seriousness… is Mohler going to speak at the Episcopal church, or elsewhere? Is the church running a series with people who hold a wide range of viewpoints?
Nancy2 wrote:
Another weapon handed to White Supremacists.
Some years ago I coined the term “Self-Defense White Supremacy”, motivated not by any race superiority BS, but the practical motive of “If we don’t stomp them down, they’re gonna stomp us down!” Zero Sum Game, Us or Them. Welcome to Rwanda.
Velour wrote:
Which Northern California city was that?
Lydi wrote:
That’s awful. I can’t imagine it happening where I live, though. When a kid gets into trouble in our high schools, there is a ton of official documentation: phone calls, emails, official letters, meetings, restorative justice sessions, electronic notations in the student’s file, etc. Some cases go through two separate disciplinary channels (admin and court) and drag on for months. And this is for fairly minor things, like graffiti on a school wall. Consequences for, say, drugs on school property are unmistakable.
Schools have more leverage over kids than we might tend to assume. No kid wants to be banned from after-school activities for 30 days. The big one is banning seniors from attending their own graduation ceremony. This threat leads to angelic behavior on prom night. 😉
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Now with Password Protection!
Lydia wrote:
You are being tormented, dear Lydia. Why would a respectable Episcopalian want to spend “An Evening with Al Mohler”?!! I know some traditional Southern Baptists who would dearly love to have an evening with him! ;^)
okrapod wrote:
In rural areas, shooting up mailboxes and street signs at night is almost a varsity team sport. I’m sure there’s a Jeff Foxworthy bit about it somewhere.
@ Darlene:
Frightening.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
In reference to the genocide of 1994? (in Rwanda?)
Rwanda is pretty stable nowadays, and a sanctuary country. There are displaced persons camps there now, helping those fleeing civil unrest in Burundi and militias in the Eastern Congo.
@ I fear a cage:
Unreal.
So, so sorry this happened to your grandmother. My heart goes out to her.
During a summer family visit with friends in another town, we attended church together. The matriarch, my girlfriend, whispered to me that there had been complaints about the usher fondling the teenage girls, as he was passing the plate to our aisle. She didn’t know what they were going to do about it. Very strange. “Report him,” I said. “Let the law handle it – they’ll know what to do.”
Lydia wrote:
Sadly, that is happening.
https://www.episcopalcafe.com/john_calvin_hes_back/
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
I can believe it.
I fear a cage wrote:
I thought nothing would surprise me anymore but there’s always something new. How is she doing?
@ okrapod:
From the link you provide: “… a friend told me last week that when he was visiting in a southern US Episcopal diocese, he was asked if he was a full 5-point Calvinist or not, with the implication given that if he wasn’t, then he wasn’t a full Christian.”
Sadly, the new reformers think this way. New Calvinists truly believe that they have come into the world for such a time as this to restore the gospel to the church that the rest of us have lost! Spurred forward by Mohler et al., a multitude of YRRs have been released in the Southern Baptist Convention to plant new churches and take over traditional ones, replacing “whosoever will” with the predestined elect as quickly as they can. They are passionate about their cause to the point of militancy.
Max wrote:
Hee hee. His 45x 22 in living color head shot was close to the sign up sheet for the Ladies wine tasting party.
siteseer wrote:
It has shaken her badly and affected her touchy heart. What made it worse was that it happened in the church she and my grandpa built up and pastored for 40 years. My grandpa died two years ago but she has been trying to stay faithful and support the new leadership. But her own precious church (and the church I grew up in) is no longer a safe place. 🙁 She has made a fuss and is demanding the church kick the perv out. And if they don’t she will leave. Unfortunately we cannot convince her to press charges. She is afraid that it will cause the world to harshly criticize the church. She’s very old school about that, sadly.
@ Max:
All God’s children got real problems with this and it is getting worse. Along comes the grinch that stole the church and they think he’s santa clause. I can understand how people can just fall into lethargy or burnout or hopelessness and drift away, or get hurt and flee for safety, or run up on problems that look unsolvable and give up, but what in blazes is the attraction in calvinism?
@ I fear a cage:
I am glad she made a fuss, though! Good for her.
Velour wrote:
Is this $299 per credit or class or does the whole degree cost $299. Because if it is the latter; sign me up so I can get a Ph.D too.
Beloved Son wrote:
I’ll sell you one for $149. I can even print it on real parchment, although the frame will be extra.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGRv-3ENDSY
Lydia wrote:
Like the cinematographic composition in Enemy at the Gates, where in all the Russian scenes you are never out-of-sight of a larger-than-life picture of Comrade Stalin. (This Stalin-era shtick was Orwell’s inspiration for “Big Brother is Watching You”.)
Max wrote:
And when 5-Points isn’t enough, there’s always 6-point Calvinists.
What’s the sixth point?
Burn all 5-point Calvinists for Heresy.
Max wrote:
Sixty-seventy years ago, it would have been Communism instead of Calvinism.
Same youthful enthusiasm, same determinism, same passion, same militancy, different words in the Party Line.
Beloved Son wrote:
It’s not $299 per credit. It’s for the Phony Degree to be issued to you, i.e. “Ph.D.”.
I think you should be able to get it by Friday, saving yourself the usual 8 years of grueling work and the dissertation.
I fear a cage wrote:
Actually, a lot of people feel the same way. It is difficult, particularly if a person doesn’t feel support of the community. As a victim, it feels like being targeted a second time.
Lydia wrote:
Well that sounds interesting. What instrument does he play?
Or does he do standup comedy? [Somehow I imagine him saying, “What’s with these Arminians? in a Seinfeld-esque voice.]
okrapod wrote:
The angry part of me sees this “attraction” as utterly sick and insane and despicable: They’re taking pleasure in a “God” who designs a whole group of people just to torture them forever.
JYJames wrote:
In this case it seems like this particular church DESERVES to be harshly criticized by the world.
Churches hiring their own police sounds like another reason to quit treating churches as special non-profits. If they had to pay local property taxes like any other non-profit, the taxes that support the local police, they would no longer have the money to waste on hiring their own.
okrapod wrote:
I have thought about this too.
There must be something in it that the thoughtful adherents need that is specific to its teachings. But WHAT? and WHY?
I ask this so that I can understand better, but sometimes we can only see ‘the other’ through the prism of our own situation and perspective ….. so that’s where a discussion among a wider community of Christian people is beneficial to better understanding.
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
thing is, HUG, that much of public school admin and faculty is a powerful force for good …. it’s just that the resources don’t cover the need enough to serve all of the children as they deserve to be served …. but what I noticed working in the public school system is that, in spite of everything, when a teacher was ‘on fire’ then her students would learn…..
I think when you contrast, compare private, parochial, and public education, in the end it may honestly come down to the strength of the individual teacher …. you have MANY great teachers in the public school system …. these individuals are the real heroes in my book and they are unsung, but these gifted people of great character are a blessing, especially to children whose situations are not optimum, yes
@ GSD:
Maybe it’s a Mohler concert?
MidwesternEasterner wrote:
Indeed. Especially since leadership was warned about the perv beforehand.
Speaking of Theonomy, take a gander at this:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2017/01/23/father-son-duo-accused-of-rape-wants-only-law-book-that-truly-matters-at-trial-the-bible/
The suspects, who are accused of keeping a woman prisoner and raping her, say they want to cite the Bible in court as their defense; they call it the “only law book that matters” and cryptically referred to “strategies” they learned from scripture. Ordinary Christians don’t go around calling the Bible a “strategy” book.
Both suspects are white and the alleged victim is black, so I wonder if the “curse of Ham” argument is going to enter into their defense somehow. Sick, sick.
All I can say is that if these suspects had been Muslims trying to cite the Quran, the president would probably have tweeted about it millions of times by now and it’d be all over social media. As it happens, no one seems to care.
And in other news: the scheduled keynote speaker at the next CPAC thinks that, um, “priest-on-boy” is just fabulous!
http://uproxx.com/news/milo-yiannopoulos-defend-pedophilia/
In Texas, security guards sometimes have quasi-police powers. One of Ed Young Sr.’S franchised locations isocated right beside my daughter’s school. During the daytime a security guard often drives around the parking lot. During pickup and dropoff the guard blocks certain routes across church property with orange cones. At first I found it very creepy to watch the grounds being patrolled with only a few cars in the parking lot, but now I just think it’s sad.
okrapod wrote:
Let Dr. Mohler explain it to you:
“Where else are they going to go? If you’re a theological minded, deeply convictional young evangelical, if you’re committed to the gospel and want to see the nations rejoice in the name of Christ, if you want to see gospel built and structured committed churches, your theology is just going to end up basically being Reformed, basically something like this New Calvinism, or you’re going to have to invent some label for what is basically going to be the same thing, there just are not options out there, and that’s something that frustrates some people, but when I’m asked about the New Calvinism — where else are they going to go, who else is going to answer the questions, where else are they going to find the resources they are going to need and where else are they going to connect. This is a generation that understands, they want to say the same thing that Paul said, they want to stand with the apostles, they want to stand with old dead people, and they know that they are going to have to, if they are going to preach and teach the truth.” (Dr. Albert Mohler, President of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary)
Where else are they going to go?! There are no options out there?!! Only New Calvinists preach and teach truth?!
With this charge to the young reformers, Dr. Mohler slammed the millions of non-Calvinist Southern Baptists who pay his salary! And he got away with it! It’s the darnedest thing I’ve ever seen!
Christiane wrote:
Well, I wish the man could sing, go on a tour, and get the heck out of SBC life!
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/utah-republican-argues-against-equal-pay-for-women-it’s-‘bad-for-families’-and-society/ar-AAn6hyH?OCID=ansmsnnews11
@ Nancy2:
Whew! Mr. Green may have to get his own police department to protect him from all the women he has stirred up!
Max wrote:
I was widowed as a young mother …… sole support for my child for a while. There are a lot of single mothers out there, single for various reasons ……… our own Shauna, for example.
I guess equal pay is really bad for families in situations like that!
@ Max:
LOL …. I meant to type ‘Mahler’, as in the composer
oh well 🙂
Nancy2 wrote:
Wow. That’s…interesting.
I haven’t gotten through comments yet, but I think a police force beholden to the interests of an institution is not a good model. They mentioned schools, but they’ve had problems with schools policing themselves too. I really think private security should be required in these instances.
Nancy2 wrote:
Sheer lunacy.
If Briarwood get’s their own police department that performs internal investigations, hope they do better than Baylor University.
Posted a link in open discussion to an article concerning Prestonwood withholding funds from SBC Cooperative Program that will be of interest to several of you here.
@ Muff Potter:
It’s been that way here for almost a decade. It has not helped children.
FW Rez wrote:
Saw that on both SBCVvoices and SBCToday. Boo hoo.
Nancy2 wrote:
Nancy2 it sure would be interesting if enough of the Mega churches in the SBC withheld money from the Cooperative Program.
Christiane wrote:
The airtight perfect System that has ALL The Answers to Everything?
MidwesternEasterner wrote:
This trial sounds like it could get “Interesting”.
Can one of us here monitor it and pass on the developments?
And Judge Tim? From your experience, what would happen in your courtroom if someone tried this defense? And do you have any ideas on how this could go?
Other than “Anyone representing himself has a fool for an attorney”?
mot wrote:
Stress triggered hysterical panic attacks?
MidwesternEasterner wrote:
People did care, and these guys had the book thrown at them. The were allowed to bring their Bibles, but prevented from using them as law books. Their strategy exposed them as the “most depraved, demented, evil people” the judge had ever seen. The jury was mostly white and mostly male,btw.
http://www.toledoblade.com/Courts/2017/01/28/Ciboros-found-guilty-on-all-counts.html
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
No Longer Quivering has been publishing my series about the Ciboro trial. Here is the link to part 20. I’m grateful you’re interested. The men might appeal their convictions.
Please consider leaving a message of encouragement to the three child victims over on NLQ (in Comments for part 20 of the NLQ series):
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/nolongerquivering/2017/02/shackled-girl-part-20-young-boy-drops-courtroom-bombshell/
@ Headless Unicorn Guy:
🙂
Christiane wrote:
Mohler plays Mahler… On what, the kazoo?
It’s a good question, about the appeal of Calvinism. I think the idea of meticulous providence can appeal to people who are insecure about their safety in a world full of pain and danger. Chanting “God is in Control.” can make a person feel better, that all of this mess is somehow working toward a larger, better purpose, and God is in the wings, behind the curtain, pulling the strings, so it’s all actually good. And the goal in life, the product of our maturity, the purest expression of faith is to learn what’s behind the curtain, and begin to see the God of Control in everything that happens. He moves in mysterious ways.
For people who are into Grace, there is the benefit of being able to attribute everything, even our coming to faith, to God alone. We have no claim to any credit for coming to faith, other than succumbing to the irresistable. So it’s easier for a Monergist to be humble about the whole thing.
And of course, if God is in control, it’s OK, even Godly, for us to be like Him, and control our little kingdoms. Or to take over a church. Or a denomination, in the name of Reformation.
And if one has Calvinist friends, or goes to a Neocal church, then there is the huge benefit of fitting in, of being able to sit at the cool kid’s table, of being able to buddy up to the lead pastor or seminary president. Going to the cool conferences.
You get to have certainty. You are right, everyone else is wrong. Where else are they going to go? Your system is the best, your logic is unassailable, your heroes are classic names of Luther, Calvin, Edwards, Spurgeon.
And there are those who simply believe that this is what Scripture says. They don’t have it all worked out, they may not even like some parts of it, but the book says what it says.
Personally, I can’t say, “God is in control.” anymore. I have trouble believing in the God of Control.
@ GSD:
In Judaism, it is said that God is sovereign AND that He also permits choice.
I am sure that He can take our mis-steps and fumbles and make something out of them that works eventually for our good …… how this happens is not always clear, but I do know two things:
1. we have been given a freedom of choice upon which much depends
2. when we fall because of our choices, God does not abandon us without help or hope
this is not the neo-Cal teaching, I know, but they seem to need ‘assurance’ because they are not comfortable with trusting Our Lord’s mercy;
it’s that ‘God of Wrath’ teaching that has ruined trusting in Him for them, and that is very, very sad
@ GSD:
Good comment. I think that there is definitely an anti-anxiety as well as an anti-depression component to calvinism and I think that perhaps it is habit forming at the same time.
GSD wrote:
And then there are plenty of sincere Christians like me who got ensnared in NeoCalvinism, when we were simply looking for a solid church to go to. I refer to NeoCalvinism as Spiritual Carbon Monoxide Poisoning. It’s subtle and can knock a person out in no time.
Then there are many others I knew at my ex-church who were raised in abusive families with some kind of major problem (like alcoholism, sexual abuse, etc.). NeoCalvinism is “home” for them and just as abusive as their upbringings. They don’t know any better. It “fits” in its own abusive, dysfunctional way. Like a woman who keeps choosing bad men to date.
I knew many people who had no concept of boundaries at my ex-church, and who were afraid to make their own decisions. They craved the structure of NeoCalvinism and were afraid of mystery.
Of course there are arrogant people in NeoCalvinism. They don’t seem to have ever encountered the true Gospel and been humbled by it.
Friend wrote:
Has the “PERSECUTION!!!!!!” spin started?
okrapod wrote:
Good question, Okrapod. Just what in the blazes IS the attraction to Calvinism? I have discussions with Calvinists often on a Facebook site. Recently, one of the Calvinist fellas stated one of his beliefs (as though it were a thing to be proud of) which went like this: “If God didn’t choose you, you’re going to be in hell and there’s nothing you can do about it.” Can you just feel the love? I responded, “Ah…such Good News. Make sure that you let folks know that when you’re evangelizing.” I just don’t get why anyone would want to be a Calvinist. I Really Don’t.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
But wait a minute, HUG. John Piper has them beat. He’s a 7-Point Calvinist. So those 5 & 6 Pointers are the Real Heretics!
Debi Calvet wrote:
And they defend their god with unmitigated zeal.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
The Ciboros have cried persecution from the moment they were arrested. The Toledo public, however, appears to view them as Bible-waving child molesters.
I fear a cage wrote:
How terrible! I hope they do kick him out.
Christiane wrote:
That’s exactly the right point. It begs the question, what does “sovereign” mean? Our western mindset takes it in the direction of control. “God is in control” = “God is sovereign.” I’ve heard the discussions that the Hebraic mind would see it more in the context of “God is in charge.” Like a human King, who basically owns his kingdom, but things still go on in the homes and alleyways that he doesn’t like or endorse.
And… This is a big can of worms. My bigger point was that some people seem to be drawn to Calvinism for bad reasons, while others seem to have good motives. Wade Burleson is an example, along with some friends of mine, and I would add that these examples seem to be classic Calvinists, not Neo-Cals [or Calvinistas].
It might be a different question to ask what draws people to the authoritarianism and exclusivism of Neo-Calvinism.
GSD wrote:
The Lure of the Inner Ring.
Illuminati who alone Have God All Figured Out.
Propinqua wrote:
Talk about a defense witness backfire…
But then, anyone who represents himself in court has a fool for an attorney.
Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
Agreed. To relate this to the topic of Briarwood, things could backfire for the future church police too. The leaders should not assume that their closed system is either closed or perfect.
Propinqua wrote:
Took a look at their opening statement on said NLQ coverage.
Woo.
Conspiracy within Conspiracy within Conspiracy within Conspiracy within Conspiracy…
GSD wrote:
This is what I’ve seen. I am sometimes amazed at the convoluted reasoning people come up with to put the things that happen to them in a “good” light and make them fit the narrative.
But it seems like the appeal is that it seems to have all the answers, in a confusing and uncertain world.
I’ve noticed that friends who were never Calvinists, per se, using very Calvinistic ways of looking at things and reasoning lately. I think that people are picking it up from all the books and speakers without even realizing it. I have one friend who’s always been staunchly Arminian/free will and even she is saying stuff about sovereignty and God being in control and how horrible we are and don’t deserve anything but hell anyway…
There are passages of the Bible that do seem to say this.
Nor can I. Of course when you’re watching your soulmate slowly die of intensely painful cancer, it’s very difficult to find comfort in this perspective. I think, to me, the control is more big picture; not that he is purposely causing every little detail of agony one goes through but that in the overarching purposes of God, he has provided something better after we’ve born the suffering this world, by its nature, entails: “These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.” “In My Father’s house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you.” Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ- I am not so sure what that means but I trust I will know someday.
GSD wrote:
Too much like chanting “Al’lah’u Akbar!” as you aim the 757 at the Twin Towers and firewall the throttles.
siteseer wrote:
Yes. Going to an old school Calvinist church, I do see where its coming from now. But there are other passages too. People try to figure things out and make it all fit and I think we just plain don’t know how it all works.
Christiane wrote:
From reading and listening to people who have escaped from these communities. If you’re being abused and escape they will bring you back to you abusers. They even have church members who work in the hospitals. In one group the entire city council was comprised of the church’s members. No justice for the oppressed.
Christiane wrote:
“C”hristian Sharia law.
Boston Lady wrote:
We all know how they viewed women.
PEARL wrote:
Scientology Blow Drill.
Is that anything like the “Ten Christian Men” government of Christian Reconstructionist/Dominionist literature?
Wasn’t it the temple police that arrested Jesus?