“Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!” ― Noel Langley, The Wizard of Oz
Good news to end the year
I’m going to be writing more about Ravi Zacharias which is bad news with which to end the year. So, I wanted to share with you some happy news on the Parsons’ family front. When my daughter, Abby, was 3 years old, she was diagnosed with a massive tumor that was quite rare and thought to be malignant. The news was not good. They gave us little hope that she would survive. Yet, after two lengthy surgeries, she seemed to defy all odds. The child who was supposed to do poorly in school ended up thriving and surviving. She is now pediatric critical care and ED nurse and is really good at what she does. She went to India on a medical mission and also did a stint on the Mercy Ship.
My mother had given me her 70-year-old engagement and wedding ring which she hoped my daughter would wear if she got married. Over Christmas, her fiancee took a knee outside of Duke Chapel and presented her with her grandmother’s ring which he had refurbished. My father would have been so proud. My 92-year-old mother, who is doing better (she wants to make it to the wedding!) cried when I told her. I am so thankful to God for this happiness and His mercy to our family.
Zacharias engaged in sexual sins for years and it is much more serious than we can imagine.
Why do we keep harping on this? This has to be one of the worst examples of a sick ministry led by an even sicker individual and watched over by an ignorant, inept board. I believe that this is only the beginning of revelations from this and other ministries.
Things continue to get worse in the RZ saga and I believe that it is going to get worse, far worse. We have to thank Steve Baughman for his doggedness in pursuing the lies told by Zacharias. Thank you, Steve!!!
We knew RZ (I can’t bring myself to use his name) was a liar. His biography was fiction mixed with fact (more fiction than fact in my opinion.) Baughman knew there was more. Any guy who lied that much should be suspected of far worse sins. But his amateurish RZIM board chose to ignore the lies. At this point, I have to wonder if they have covered up for years of sins.
Relevant Magazine wrote An Interim Report Has Found That Ravi Zacharias ‘Engaged In Sexual Misconduct Over Many Years.’
…an investigative firm hired by RZIM has found “credible evidence” that Zacharias “engaged in sexual misconduct over many years.”
…Some of that misconduct is consistent with and corroborative of that which is reported in the news recently,” the interim report said. “And some of the conduct we have uncovered is more serious.”
…The executive committee says that the interim report found evidence of behavior that was “deeply troubling and wholly inconsistent with the man Ravi Zacharias presented both publicly and privately to so many over more than four decades of publicly ministry.
Stop! Reread the last sentence in the second quote again? There was conduct even more serious than what has been reported? Like what? We know about the massage therapists who have come forward.
The executive committee says that the interim report found evidence of behavior that was “deeply troubling and wholly inconsistent with the man Ravi Zacharias presented both publicly and privately to so many over more than four decades of publicly ministry.
…In September, three massage therapists came forward, saying Zacharias touched them inappropriately, exposed himself and engaged in other acts of sexual misconduct over a period of about five years. Zacharias was co-owner of several Atlanta-area spas before he passed away.
You can see the entire interim report at Julie Roys’s blog post Interim Report Finds Ravi Zacharias “Engaged in Sexual Misconduct Over Many Years” Why interim? I think there is a heckuva a lot more to come.
What are the problems with the interim report?
An interesting analysis was posted at Reasons for God: An Assessment of the December 23, 2020, RZIM Board Statement.
For example, the RZIM board membership remains anonymous.
…we don’t know who wrote or signed this statement
… very few people, including employees, know who serves on RZIM’s board of directors, much less on the Executive Committee.
…he board has not authorized the disclosure of Form 990 statements to either employees or the public. The last one available is for the fiscal year ending in 2015.
…This statement prompts the memory that, at all-staff meetings this fall, sometimes Sarah Davis (RZIM’s Global CEO and Chair of the Board) and Abdu Murray (RZIM’s General Counsel and Senior Vice President) would awkwardly alternate between saying “the board” and “we.”
…Did anyone who serves on the board, yet is not on the Executive Committee, have evidence that Ravi was responsible for sexual misconduct?
…Ravi lacked accountability and transparency.
…Executive Committee is admitting that they did not have the safeguards in place to detect his pattern of grossly abusive behavio
…it is further confirmed that Ravi was willing to sexually abuse women in the spas that he co-owned, the board’s defense that he couldn’t possibly have asked for nude photos from Lori Anne Thompson is absurd.
…did anyone in the Zacharias family know, or turn a blind eye to, Ravi’s involvement with other women?
Most critically, as devastating as it is to learn about sexual misconduct of a beloved family member or former role model (and it is), surely it is far more devastating to experience sexual misconduct?…To avoid further trauma to the victims, will they change the name of the ministry? Cease publication of Ravi’s books? Remove his material from the website, YouTube, and other channels? Request that radio stations remove programming that features Ravi Zacharias?
It is my opinion that the RZIM board and the Executive Committee did not live up to the expected standards of overseers. Unlike the author of this post, my experience causes me to wonder if some of them knew of RZ’s proclivities and covered them up so as *not to cause harm to the ministry.” This is an excuse that I have heard over and over, including today when I interviewed a woman who was told not to report her abuse to the authorities by her pastors. I’ll be writing her story in the near future. I tweeted the following today. (I am trying to get Todd and my tweets to appear on TWW in real-time.)
Carson Weitnauer, who worked with RZIM, confesses he should have known and that RZ was one of the greatest frauds of his generation.
The author of the Good Reasons post, Carson Weitnauer, wrote today, in the Christian Post, The ‘greatest apologist’ Ravi Zacharias and his catastrophic betrayal
…As we sometimes heard troubling details that suggested Ravi was guilty of what he had been accused of, it was a relief to hear that his incriminating emails were taken out of context, that exculpatory material had been reviewed by the board, and that his courageous RICO lawsuit had put an end to their falsehoods with a non-disclosure agreement. We gave thanks that Ravi’s bold leadership had freed us to focus once more on the ministry God had called us to. Convinced of this narrative, I served at RZIM with great passion and joy, and then wept and grieved for weeks when Ravi’s health unexpectedly declined, followed by his death in May of 2020.
…More humbling and embarrassing was the realization that the public evidence was sufficient for me to have pieced together the truth in 2017. Anyone who has taken pride in their association with Ravi, and especially those who like me work at RZIM, will now experience that as a shame. I confess that my longing for the approval of others kept me from asking hard questions and accepting the painful truth much sooner.
…Just as I was awakening to an accurate understanding of the abuse uncovered in 2017, another bombshell came: credible, carefully researched reports appeared in Christianity Todayand WORLD magazines, demonstrating that Ravi had committed criminal sexual abuse against at least three massage therapists in the mid-to-late-2000s.
…While I believe most of my colleagues are not only talented but earnestly committed to serving God, we have been badly misled by our secretive board and senior leaders. If the damage to our witness can be repaired at all, it will take a humiliating acknowledgment of our complicity and shame, as well as an earnest and sacrificial repentance
…a grealization that Ravi Zacharias was not the greatest apologist of his generation – but rather one of its greatest frauds – has felt like a catastrophic betrayal.
Some thoughts
- Steve told us in a comment that RZ was importing *masseuses* from India and Thailand. It is possible that these women were being sex trafficked which is a federal crime, if true.
- RZ traveled around the world. It is possible that women in other countries were harmed/molested by RZ. Does anyone remember Tom White of the Voice of the Martyrs? His story is eerily similar to RZ’s story. RZ could easily go off the grid while traveling and that is worrisome to me.
- Were there other women besides Lori Anne Thomson who RZ groomed or even molested? Are there other NDAs?
- I find it difficult to believe that no one ever suspected something was up with RZ. That goes for his board and the number of evangelicals who were in his BFF circle. Did anyone think it was odd that he was running *masseuse* parlors? How many kept quiet so as not to ruin a good thing? RZ was a cash cow to a number of people so was it convenient to pay no attention to the man behind the curtain?
- Has anyone taken a good hard look at RZ’s teachings? Given his penchant for lying, I would suspect that one might find a similar problem in his writings and teachings.
- There is something that I don’t get. As Christians, we know that all have sinned and all continue to sin. Why is it so gosh darn hard to imagine celebrity leaders becoming involved n serious sin? Is there something I missed in Bible study? Remember David who raped Bathsheba and arranged for her husband Uriah to be killed?
- Al those who served anonymously on the Boards of RZIM should resign in shame and should NEVER be allowed to be elders or board members in the church or parachurch ministries. RZIM should release the names of all those who served on the Board and the Executive Committee. Time for them to learn from others who take their jobs seriously.
We have much to learn from this mess. The question is “Are we willing to look long and hard at our chosen leaders?” You can be quite sure that more of this sort of thing is going on.
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First to comment. Sad read. I liked many of the folks at RZIM.
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Your good news is really really great, Dee.
And the bad news is well …
But thank you for both, and for all you do.
Rock on in 2021!
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It appears that RZ doesn’t seem to have had much of an impact outside the Evangelical Industrial Complex (EIC). And that seems to have been rather deliberate on his part. He had always appeared within “safe spaces.” So, for example, when he spoke at Famous University, he wasn’t generally invited by Famous U or the faculty of Famous U, but by an Evangelical-related group which may have been recognized by Famous U but had an existence separate from Famous U and met on Famous U’s campus. He did this over and over and over again. It doesn’t appear that he ever published anything outside the EIC bubble. But he felt quite at home presenting himself as a great thinker (with, up until recently, the credentials to match) to his mainly Evangelical audiences.
Oh, and what’s odd is that I occasionally see statements that RZ converted from Hinduism. The truth of the matter is that he was raised in an Anglican household. It was his great-great-great grandmother from a high-ranking Hindu caste who converted to Christianity. And that’s in the RZIM obituary. There’s just something weird about that.
I have my great-grandmother’s antique Edwardian wedding set. My mother handed it over to me one day after I turned 30 with a comment along the lines of “doesn’t look like you’re getting married anytime soon, but I don’t want this lost.” Yeah, I still have it. I used to wear the set all the time, but since I’ve lost weight, I need to have the rings resized. Congratulations to your entire family on your daughter’s marriage!
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Dee, who am I to take you task about victim advocacy, but perhaps you need to rethink how you represent the David and Bathsheba story.
David “molested” Bathsheba?
She ended up pregnant. It was rape. I hate to see David’s behavior minimized any more than RZ.
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Congratulations, Dee, and thanks for sharing your family stories. Very encouraging & inspiring, full of life & giving (serving others) & joy. God is so good, so very good. Your daughter turned her early struggle into a life of giving, right in the medical field, and with children. Warms my heart.
For those experiencing loss, may you find God’s grace & peace & loving friends even in your loss.
For the rest of us, may we be there for others, just as we would like others to be there for us. God grant us the guidance & courage to be generous exactly where needed, even as God is ever so generous with us.
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Remember Judah’s impregnating his own daughter-in-law (Gen 38)? Yet he and David were forefathers of one, Jesus Christ (see Matthew 1). Thus it appears to have ever been: 1) that God’s people seldom live the values they want to enforce on others; 2) that we’re all potential muckrakers.
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You mentioned Tom White of VOM. There is still unfinished business there as the only two things that have ever been disclosed about where their money actually goes to have both been about child molestation. I lived what some at RZIM personnel are going through now with that pile of evil. And I am the only one to publicly report that Tom White got caught in South America first shortly before he got caught in Bartlesville, OK. The family and ministry had to use money for a bribe to get White out of trouble with the local authorities, so the official announcement from the VOM Board was a pack of lies. They knew what he was and did nothing which allowed the then 10 year old to get abused.
I have been warned about x-pats from India from my contact running a mission there. Their opinion is that ALL of the famous Indians over here are running scams. It is a big business there as the country is a Kleptocracy and lying for riches is not generally considered to be evil by their culture. We have a lot to learn. KP is a bigger fraud in terms of what he has done. Created a whole cult of personality because of the hundreds of millions westerners gave him.
The worse things will certainly come out. Today Julie reported that multiple Christian radio broadcasts have dropped RZIM’s programs from their line ups. I expect there will be a lot more to report on next year as the Mammon dries up further and it is no longer available to buy off the silence of those who have been victims.
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Congratulations to all of you as you celebrate your daughter’s engagement. Good news indeed.
I have been following the development of the unravelling of RZ’s deceptions. I’m grateful this is all coming out and I especially pray for his victims. The individuals, groups and institutions that enabled this for do long need to be held to account.
In what’s been coming out, there is frequent reference to 3 types of offences—lying about his credentials, the grooming/sexting/NDA & the abuses at the spas. There is another victim that no one seems to mention in what is now coming out. Why is she being left out? She deserves to be acknowledged & the harm done to her validated. Her name is Shirley Steward and told her story on the blog Spiritual Sounding Board. Here is the link https://www.google.ca/amp/s/spiritualsoundingboard.com/2019/06/24/as-a-new-christian-and-missionary-alliance-minister-ravi-zacharias-pressured-his-brothers-16-yr-old-girlfriend-to-have-illegal-abortion/amp/
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What you point out is compelling.
Fraudster in the Evangeo-Bubble or soup, where the trifecta of goons, graft, & grift swirl about & swim free, apparently. When this is what the evangeo-bubblers go for, a sick fraudster like this, perhaps it’s healthier to stay out of their soup. Not family friendly, by all appearances.
Re: boards, is it not true that the qualifications are:
1) to be a big donor &
2) to backslap or rubberstamp the org & leader(s), pretty much?
Board members are glad-handers with money but without discernment & conscience? Perhaps these monied glad-handers are equally in sync with goons, graft, & grift, since this sick pervert is someone they choose to support.
For the org & its leader, not having big bucks is a deal-breaker (for those who seek to be on the inside track). However, predatory practices are overlookable in this ministry.
Danny Thomas once said that those who support good are equally effective as those who do good.
Perhaps likewise those who support evil predators while silencing & gaslighting those with evidence (witnesses, victims). The supporters choose those they will believe. In this case, the evil monster.
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RZIM hasn’t published 990s in the last few years because it changed its status to that of a church/synagogue/etc that aren’t required to file 990s. It was not the only Christian org to do so (CRU aka Campus Crusade is another that switched).
Note 990s are required to be publicly available though certain info set by law can be blacked out.
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Muslin, fka Dee Holmes,
You are EXACTLY correct… RZ was a show for the EIC. There are a number of scholars in Academia that do what RZ “tried to do”, but the are not “showboats”. Years ago, at a VERITAS forum question and answer presentation, I saw one of these scholars get “harassed” by one of the “money bags” underwriting the VERITAS forum because the true scholar was being objective and “scholarly”, not a “turn or burn” evangelist….. It was at that point ( and a similar personal experience giving a talk to a smaller evangelical group) that I started distancing myself from “campus ministries”
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I wonder how many of the questions he answered were staged.
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What the public that purchased the RZIM wares (and RZIM have had utterly colossal impact at barely one remove) missed in Bible study is that prophecy is about understanding the past.
The dharma and karma of the C&MA is blackmailing suicidal children, inexorably swallowing all those within range.
RZIM are supposed to be the proof that faith in Christ instead of using inference from our fellow’s relationship with Holy Spirit and background knowledge on all subjects, is “intellectually respectable” by “3D printed” standards.
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Thanking God with you on the family blessings. Rejoicing with those who rejoice!
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It is a great comfort in old age to see that one’s children’s children are thriving. May Dee’s Mom be granted many more years of such joy.
—-
I did not follow RZ closely, but the little exposure (no pun intended) I had to him suggested to me that he was more persuasive as a speaker than as a writer. I’m tempted to think that the undeniable success with his preferred audience can be attributed to a blend of earnestness, a charming accent, and the audience’s desire to believe that it was part of a movement that had all the answers.
In the end, it becomes apparent that he was just another “super-apostle”, taking advantage of the churches. We were warned about this nearly 2000 years ago.
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brad/futuristguy,
YOu have been a long time friend and I loved the chance to meet you.
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Muslin, fka Dee Holmes,
His entire life was a lie. he reminds me of Ergiun Caner. Your comment is spot on.
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“It is my opinion that the RZIM board and the Executive Committee did not live up to the expected standards of overseers.” (Dee)
This, unfortunately, is quite common in the Christian Industrial Complex. When a “ministry” reaches too-big-to-fail status, it seems that many elder boards become monkeys on chains which see no evil-hear no evil-speak no evil … Hybels, Driscoll, MacDonald, Falwell Jr., etc. etc.
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I agree. Bathsehba was raped. I used the molestation word with the hops this wouldn’t turn into a *defend David from the temptress, Bathsheba. However, it appears that I did the opposite. Here is a post I wrote a couple of years ago.
http://thewartburgwatch.com/2018/08/01/why-i-believe-that-king-david-assaulted-bathsheba-justiceforbathsheba-metoo/
I caused a ruckus in Community Bible Study when I *shared* that Bathsheba was raped. Several older laides almost fainted. So, in keeping with what you and I believe, I shall change the word to *rape.*
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I suspect that there is much in his writings that is suspect. Let’s see if I’m right.
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Don Jones,
Thank you. It is rather an emotional time for me since her soon to be new life brings up how serious her illness was. I am so grateful for her life. She is the kindness person you could meet. People from all walks of life love her. I learn much from observing her life close up.
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Max,
I need to write a post on it. There are many men (and a few women) who should be ashamed of their role in allowing a fraud to preach and teach.
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“RZIM board membership remains anonymous” (Dee)
Johnny Hunt?
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I was thinking also of his speeches with Q&A at the end. How many of the skeptics were staged? For example: https://www.rzim.org/listen/just-a-thought/what-is-your-question
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I’ve been known to do similar things, to tell it like it is, to put truth before tradition. During my long church experience, I have endeavored to afflict the comfortable in addition to comforting the afflicted.
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Jeffrey J Chalmers,
Eric Metaxas
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Congratulations to your daughter, Dee, and to all your family! I’m so glad to hear some happy news amongst all the bad of this year.
Here in Japan, it is now officially 2021. Wishing everyone at TWW a Happy New Year! Akemashite omedeto gozaimasu!
Please stay safe!
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dee,
Looked him up. Also a fraudster apologist. Seems to be a thing in this field of work, for some reason.
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dee,
For example hanging any weight for his “argument winning” on the spiel about the Seleucids, as spotted by Steve B. The past was contingency, once.
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Some years ago I watched a movie, half in English, half in Hindi, where basically a politician causes the end of the world. It was a comedy, seriously, and here’s why. After the end of the world, the only things that survived were cockroaches and … this politician.
Maybe we should add religious con artists as well! For the record, the Indian press has a name for these types–they are called “godmen” and no this is not a nice term!
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Metaxas is having a moment of his own right now and it’s not looking good. For more details, Warren Throckmorton has a blog post and a link to the defamation suit where Metaxas is a defendant. Otherwise it’s beyond the scope of TWW.
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I dunno. I’ve heard him speak a few times. The thing about apologetics is that it’s really not all that deep. His opponent can bring up deep questions, but they are usually the same questions over and over again at every venue. Most apologetics books just rehash the same content, often in the same ways. And the questions asked often aren’t as personal as questions a person might ask a pastor when they are struggling.
I don’t think it’s half as intellectual as many Christians have made it out to be.
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Off thread, but lest we forget about that other bad-boy John MacArthur. In a Q&A time last Sunday, a church member asked JMac the Magnificent if she should take the COVID vaccine. His response:
“A it is now, you have a 99.998% chance of having no lasting effect from COVID. From what we hear, the vaccine is 94% effective. So why reduce your odds?” (insert loud laughter from congregation)
I don’t know who bothers me the most regarding this rebellion. JMac or the multitude that follow him!
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You have to be a fraud yourself to do so. The cause of Christ is worth much much more than keeping a charlatan in the pulpit. Forsaking the genuine for the counterfeit never turns out good. Those who cover sin are just as guilty as those who commit it before God.
“For nothing is hidden, except to be revealed; nor has anything been kept secret, but that it would come to light [that is, things are hidden only temporarily, until the appropriate time comes for them to be known].” (Mark 4:22 AMP)
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Yes.
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2 in 100,000 chance of “lasting effect”?
Hmm — 330,000 dead at recent count, 0.1% of US population, which is 100 in 100,000 probability, thus far, of experiencing the “lasting effect” of “mortality”. And that doesn’t consider the much more common “long COVID” effects.
I hope that JM lives long enough to become ashamed of himself, but it may be that medical technology isn’t advanced enough to keep him going that long.
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Who were the leaders, churches, and Christian organizations inviting Ravi to speak at events, especially after the Christianity Today article in late 2017 where he roasted his victim with lies while using his immense influence and power to destroy her? Who were the prominent pastors who publicly lauded him until the very end? It is a long list, one which needs to be scrutinized carefully to begin holding feet to fire.
Start with the prominent names who were asked by Ravi and his family to speak at his funeral in May 2020, then go from there.
https://web.archive.org/web/20200813173637/https://decisionmagazine.com/ravi-zacharias-remembered-as-a-gentle-giant-of-our-faith/ (original link no longer works)
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I was able to get my 1st Moderna vaccine 2 days ago, so far minimal side effects!
And JMac’s 99.998% is likely off by a few orders of magnitude… I’d definitely call death a ‘lasting effect’.
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The RZIM Facebook comments are most interesting. 3 years ago RZIM posted that the accusations of sexual misconduct were lies. Fans: It’s the attack of the devil! And Potiphar’s wife! Dec 23 RZIM posts that the accusations of sexual misconduct are true. Fans: It’s the attack of the devil! We don’t believe it, and even if we did, he’s dead and never got the chance to defend himself and why are they just bringing this up before Xmas and we’re all sinners and and and….. King David! And that settles it for me!
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Excellent insight and questions. Also, I never once heard Ravi articulate law and gospel. Does the Bible teach that David raped Bathsheba?
Thank you.
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I can’t help but be amazed at the charismatic power and influence of RZ that only after he can no longer influence, spin, persuade, control because he is dead, does the thick smoke clear and we can all see. No doubt were he still alive he would have been able to continue as usual. I agree it casts much suspicion on the veracity of his ministry. Likewise John MacArthur’s abhorrent abilities in elementary mathematics and utter blindness to that fact make it incredulous that anyone would listen to him about anything. I can’t imagine what the parents of the 5th graders in his church say when their kids tell them his math is wrong. Seriously? Is there not one competent leader that can correct him on his math and statistics? He is making an utter mockery of the intelligence of anyone who identifies as Christian.
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It’s scary. Poor leaders talk ignorant nonsense and most people in the congregation don’t know any better than to laugh and applaud. There are probably people who went home thinking, “I’m actually safer not getting the vaccine – the pastor proved it mathematically!” And now they will be at greater risk because their pastor doesn’t understand basic statistics. Of course, churches like that teach that basic science and math are suspect.
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Not only does MacArthur not understand statistics, he also does not know how to multiply probabilities.
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Should read “As it is now, you have …”
As it is now JMac, you have given the world another reason to mock the church. (which of course, is not ‘the’ Church)
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Robert Morris would call such reports “gossip” and that blogs which post such things are “Satan’s Hit List”. Of course, RZIM and Morris are simply trying to shame folks into not reading the truth about celebrity preachers.
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Judith,
I absolutely believe that it does. I always go to the Bible to see what it tells us. Many people in the Christian world are turning to this understanding-especially those who are Christian abuse advocates. Rachel Denhollander has weighed in and she agrees as well. Here is ap ost that I wrote on the matter. http://thewartburgwatch.com/2018/08/01/why-i-believe-that-king-david-assaulted-bathsheba-justiceforbathsheba-metoo/
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Judith,
The law and gospel is tricky for someone living out the lifestyle that RZ chose.
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“We have much to learn from this mess. The question is “Are we willing to look long and hard at our chosen leaders?”” (Dee)
Nothing surprises me anymore. And we wonder why we don’t have a revival in the Church and a spiritual awakening in America?! We have a spiritual leadership crisis … there is no one to lead us to victory. Oh sure, we have small victories here and there, in local churches, lead by pastors you never heard of, in obscure places. But what name brand is humbling himself, repenting, turning from his wicked ways, and seeking God in order for God to forgive our sins and heal our land? You sure won’t find them in personality cults, mega-mania, or in the ivory towers of the Christian Industrial Complex. Come Lord Jesus!
“You can be quite sure that more of this sort of thing is going on.” (Dee)
“Do you see what they are doing — the utterly detestable things the elders are doing here, things that will drive me far from my sanctuary? … do you see what the elders do in the dark? … for they say, ‘The Lord does not see us'” (Ezekiel 8)
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Given the power differential and the language of the narrative, it doesn’t look (to me) like a consensual relationship.
Also, the subsequent narrative shows how David’s transgressions led to trouble within his own household. Amnon’s rape of Tamar is parallel to David and Bathsheba. Absalom’s reprisal against Amnon is parallel to what David had done to Uriah.
I think that the inference that the original transgression was not consensual is the most likely one.
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I think what we are seeing with the statements from individuals that work (worked) for and with RZIM is motivated by self-preservation and the realization that they will need to continue to receive a paycheck and that it won’t likely be from RZIM now that this is being confirmed by RZIM itself. They now need to speak out and get on the “right side” of this story to distance themselves from this organization and prepare for future moves.
Surely these intelligent individuals who worked on this inside would have had even greater insight into RZ & his behavior than the outsiders that pursued the truth for the last few years. How can you be a brilliant apologist and critical thinker while being (willfully) blind to this level of deception?
I’m not saying those employed by RZIM should be permanently on-ice here, but I would seriously question their judgment and discernment, and also question the motives behind their current statements. I think it is less about pressuring RZIM and more about ensuring they are speaking up on the public record now that the ship is definitely sinking.
Why didn’t they speak up earlier? Are we really supposed to believe these bright folk just “missed” it all? If so, are they really that bright? I think some RZIM employees are additional victims of RZ’s deception but others are (unwitting) accomplices.
In the corporate world, whenever I run into someone who worked for Enron, I wonder what they were thinking at that time. Yes, many inside & out were deceived (even intelligent & hard-working folks) and not everyone was guilty of the scheming of Jeff Skilling, Ken Lay, & co. But it still makes me wonder. The only person I’ve met who worked there that made a good impression was forced out before the implosion.
Most of the more senior folks looking for rafts in the wreckage seemed suspicious to me. Same thing here.
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S. Jane,
Great question. Who were they? Aiding and abetting. They deserve a closer look, too.
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A thought that has been “itching” in the “background processes” of my thinking for a number of years is the possibility that among powerful church leaders there might be a kind of OT/NT relativism that could help to justify behavior of this kind in their own minds — this assumes that the people in question are not simply sociopaths with no functional conscience at all.
It was mentioned above in commentary on the JH videos that he seems to have difficulty looking at the congregation — perhaps a hopeful sign of a sensitive conscience. How does someone whose conscience is not completely inactive find ways to justify behaviors of the kind RZ has done?
In OT, polygyny was explicitly permitted, though regulated in the interest of fair treatment of plural wives. This is an uncomfortable-to-present-sensibilities feature of the then culture that does not seem to have been sufficiently offensive to YHWH to have been outlawed. Even more troubling is the practice of concubinage, which is clearly present in the period of the judges and at least into the early period of the kings.
Given that powerful and/or wealthy men of that period were permitted these … liberties … without negative commentary in the inspired text (Solomon is an exception to this silence, but he took it to another level entirely), I wonder whether it might occur to powerful and wealthy men in our day whose appetites resemble David’s that “the fact that these practices are permitted in the OT implies that they are not intrinsically evil”. (I disagree at this point; I think that they are intrinsically evil; but permitted in that culture on account of the hardness of men’s hearts.) Having crossed that mental hurdle, a lot of behavorial restraints might fall away as opportunities presented themselves.
I write this not to defend these practices or this kind of thinking, but to try to understand how people who walk the path RZ walked might be able to live with themselves.
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Samuel Conner,
unhappy thoughts at the end of an unhappy year.
Let’s hope 2021 is a good one, without too many tears.
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I get so tired of these pervert preachers dragging David into their mess! David was in the military, not the ministry, for God’s sake!! And he paid dearly for his sins – have these preacher-boys forgotten that part of the story?
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I’ve been trying to find an appropriate place in this thread to say something. But there just isn’t a good spot in this sad year-end story, that typifies the pervert-pulpit-pandemic we are in, to say it. So, I’ll say it anyway.
HAPPY NEW YEAR, WARTBURGERS!
As we leave 2020 behind (Praise the Lord!) and move forward to the hope of a better 2021, “May the Lord of peace Himself give you peace at all times in every way. The Lord be with you all.” (2 Thessalonians 3:16)
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Max,
Actually David is described as king and divinely anointed to lead the people; he is not just a military man. I suspect some ministers see themselves in the same position. On the whole in the Bible those around David seem to have paid more dearly. Bathsheba loses a child; his daughter is raped by her half-brother (and David does nothing); his concubines are raped by his son; his wife Michal has her sons (or nephews[1]) handed over by him to be murdered and their bodies desecrated in revenge for something their grandfather had done; the 70,000 Israelites killed by pestilence because David took a census.
[1] 2 Samuel 21 has textual variants of either Michal or her sister Merab.
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As the old saying goes for every rat you catch you know there typically are a lot more that you didn’t catch. Thus I am sure there is something similar with Ravi, i.e. there are a lot more cases than we know about now and probably a lot we won’t know about this side of eternity.
Why are stories like this such a broken record and repeated. Hopefully one day the body of Christ will learn why this so often occurs and what needs to be done to help prevent this.
This is an interesting post on this topic:
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/rolltodisbelieve/2020/12/29/how-ravi-zacharias-got-away-with-sex-abuse-for-years/
though definitely not written from a Christian perspective but still a lot of insight.
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Ditto.
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That is a phrase I am well aware of and have used many times in posts. KP and Ravi both fit the phrase all too well. KP has the greatest fraud going I have ever seen and he is still at it. VOM is the most wicked scam I have ever come across and boy did that one cost me a lot personally. Using donor funds to molest children is something exceedingly vile.
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Nor a minister with an international visibility. King Cyrus was also anointed by God, but didn’t know Him. David, of course, became a man after God’s own heart … but he had quite a journey before he got there.
There’s nothing worse in life than to see your family suffer as the result of your sins … it was a price that David paid dearly.
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Because an undiscerning church allows it to happen. Charlatans wouldn’t have a stage if they didn’t have a gullible audience buying tickets to the show.
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Thx, Max. Yes, God bless you, Dee, and all the Wartburgers. Upward & onward in 2021, taking the stairs. (Lies take the elevator, truth takes the stairs. Love those stairs, every step of the way. No shortcuts.)
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“If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.” (2 Chronicles 7:14)
Unfortunately, I don’t see much movement in that direction. I thought maybe the pandemic would get the church’s attention in this regard … but I thought that too during 911, natural disasters, political chaos, and other birth pains that are intensifying.
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IOW:
The powerful prey on & pass around the vulnerable like popcorn while “Good Folks”* in the theatre silently view the film screen. In the same room. Popcorn consumption going on.
“Isn’t me,” complicit Good Folks* say, “I never hurt anyone, touch a minor.”
Goons Graft Grift: Power Vice $$$. Buying tickets for the show, BTW, is PAYING FOR THE SHOW. Underwriting a pervert who misrepresents himself.
Re: Misrepresentation. On Netflix “Border Security: America’s Front Line” shows Border Patrol agents who handle those who misrepresent themselves (Americans, too, BTW) at US borders. (This is NOT ICE, no children, no cages.) It’s highly civilized but there are consequences to any/all “misrepresentation of self”. Repeatedly the agents advise being honest, because the agents will find out.
Unfortunately, in the clergy & ministry world, misrepresentation of self is not taken seriously.
Border Patrol agents note: if they discover one discrepancy, (like food when “No food” declared), the agent hunkers down & does a thorough search. A lie is usually the tip of the iceberg. Agents are normal nice people, highly trained, very disciplined, extremely polite and methodical. They understand behavior & the law.
Imagine, church stepping up to this level of practical wisdom for the well-being of all.
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Happy New Year to all! I am thinking I will celebrate in my work clothes tonight so that I will not have to change into my pajamas before going to bed. Hoping to wake up to a less eventful year. My wife always insists we follow the German tradition of watching “Dinner for One” on this day of the year, which we are about to do now. It’s easy to find on YouTube.
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Also, I’m surprised at some of the comments making broad generalizations about Indians and stereotyping based on this case. Let’s not paint with an overly broad brush.
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Danny,
I completely agree… the same can be said for the leadership at Boeing the last 1.5 decades…. I have heard enough “inside stories” to make my skin crawl…
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Why, the Southern Baptist Convention of course!
He was featured speaker at their 2018 Annual Meeting:
https://www.baptistpress.com/resource-library/news/ravi-zacharias-never-underestimate-god/
“Convictions will ‘drive you through life, especially in the toughest seasons of the soul,’ Christian apologist Ravi Zacharias told Southern Baptists Tuesday evening (June 12) at their annual meeting in Dallas…”
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Max,
Not only COVID NOT a call for the Church to “repent”, as we are seeing many in “The Church” are denying/downplaying it…. all the while people are suffering and dying….. it is quite breathtaking really….
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Max,
Not only is COVID NOT a call for the Church to “repent”, as we are seeing many in “The Church” are denying/downplaying it…. all the while people are suffering and dying….. it is quite breathtaking really….
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“BUT $OUL$ WERE BEING $AVED!”
(And the money was coming in in buckets…)
I am at the point of “You really expect anything different from CHRISTIANS(TM)?”
I keep thinking of the vocal Atheist channels on YouTube like Telltale, Telltale Podcast, Holy Koolaid, Genetically Modified Skeptic, Thinking Atheist… All of them making more and more sense as scandal after scandal, ManaGAWD after ManaGAWD, RZ after RZ comes out of the Christians(TM) and those channels pick them up.
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DON’T YOU GO MR JESPERSON ON US, MAX!
YOU’RE SOUNDING ONE VISION/DREAM/PRIVATE REVELATION FROM THERE!
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This Year Is A Dumpster Fire, parts 1 & 2:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lK6tdsVS2tI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VaIAPaTEq7I
A bit of merch from Telltale’s Etsy shop:
THE 2020 DUMPSTER FIRE CANDLEHOLDER!
YOU TOO CAN HAVE YOUR OWN DESK/TABLETOP DUMPSTER FIRE!
https://www.etsy.com/listing/814183979/dumpster-fire-tealight-candle-holder?ref=shop_home_active_3&crt=1
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King David was also the archetype of the highly-competent, successful celebrity hero who’s also a total failure when it comes to his family and household.
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“THE MONEY WAS TOO GOOD! I GOT STUPID!”
— Jayne Cobb, when Captain Mal was ready to blow him out Serenity‘s airlock
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Thanks for speaking up. This is not the first time that comment has been made here in recent weeks.
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You’re articulating something that I’ve struggled with all year. Much evil in the church comes from bad human behavior, not “powers and principalities” or even misguided believers. Bad people coopt the strength of the church and certain words of the Bible. A lot of it is plain old business fraud but hard to identify, because we don’t want to believe that some preachers are completely faking it. And they are skilled at faking.
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The REAL meaning of Generational Curse.
David’s “transgression” set a chain of events in action that echoed through his family, generation after generation, finally blowing it (and the nation) apart two generations later.
Amnon looks at Tamar, remembers his father & Bathsheba, thinks “He got away with it, so can I!”
Absalom avenges Tamar by offing Amnon & staring a civil war for the throne.
And when the dust settles, Bathsheba’s son Solomon ends up with the succession like Claudius — Last Heir Standing.
And after Solomon, his son Rebohoam(?) and his drinking buddies blow apart not only the House of David/Royal Family but the entire COUNTRY.
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Paging Victor Frankenstein… Paging Victor Frankenstein…
(Or Maester Qyburn of Kings’ Landing…)
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For a lot of Chrsitians, it’s the Cause so Righteous it justifies any evil whatsoever to advance it. “FOR THE CAUSE!”
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ishy,
A lot of apologetics is really Preaching to the Choir, trying to reassure Christians that “Yes, We Are Right and THEY ARE WRONG!” Even if they have to stretch things until it breaks.
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It’s now 2021 here in the Eastern United States. Happy New Year to Dee, Todd and all the TWW commenters!
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“…wholly inconsistent with the man Ravi Zacharias presented both publicly and privately to so many over more than four decades of publicly ministry.”
+++++++++++++++++++++
“to so many”
they could easily be saying, “to so many– but not everyone– like family and some close friends, who actually did know something”– and get away with not lying.
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OT but FYI:
https://fpmt.app.box.com/s/j4aa6zozn8yiuv2vj7llgxd1wvav073m
The Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition (FPMT) is an international network of Tibetan Buddhist dharma centers headed and co-founded by Thubten Zopa Rinpoche (“Lama Zopa”). A few years ago another of their lamas, Dagri Rinpoche, was accused of sexually harassing or abusing a number of women–mainly nuns, but also a stranger on a plane. The FPMT commissioned the FaithTrust Institute to conduct an independent investigation. This is their summary report (a full report having been delivered privately to the FPMT boards.)
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“realization that Ravi Zacharias was not the greatest apologist of his generation – but rather one of its greatest frauds – has felt like a catastrophic betrayal.”
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
i’ll say it more directly (because there is no reason not to):
“it is a catastrophic betrayal.”
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“RZIM should release the names of all those who served on the Board and the Executive Committee. Time for them to learn from others who take their jobs seriously.”
++++++++++++++++
were the Board paid?
that would certainly explain their motive, in part at least.
.
.
the other parts can be explained by:
–Ravi’s and RZIM’s celebrity and hero-worship, which had grown so big as to be out of control– it was too big in many senses. “too big to stop now”
–the error of thinking that the kingdom of God depends on Ravi and RZIM;
–and evangelical culture’s really dumb & non-thinking error of “the ends justify the means.
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“We have much to learn from this mess. The question is “Are we willing to look long and hard at our chosen leaders?””
++++++++++++++++++=
and are evangelicals willing to look long and hard at themselves? to some degree they let this happen.
(a few years ago i would have included myself & said ‘ourselves’– but i’ve extricated myself from it all)
.
.
evangelicals have been brainwashed to believe whatever they’re told, and to be passive and compliant (not everyone, thankfully — but a majority, it seems)
(and so paranoid of sinning that they play it safe at all times, prioritizing their own status with God over victims whom they ignore)
their leaders and powerbrokers have tweaked their official doctrine and theology to tell them so.
just look at TGC — full of articles with a subtext of equating passive compliance with godliness.
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so, 5 comments in a row — yes, not much going on around here this New Year’s Eve.
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Headless Unicorn Guy,
That’s, Frahnkensteen.
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Critical thinking isn’t exactly valued, from what I have seen. Many churches deny most of what science has discovered in the last 500 years. If God fabricated everything from fossils to galaxies to appear be something different from what they actually are, and accepting illusions is the essential starting point, then anything goes.
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Jacob,
You are exactly correct…
a significant subfraction of humans “do not like change”. This is a “personality type issue”.
Humans scientific understanding of the World has RADICALLY changed over the last 150+years…
So, through in, as Max likes to says, a “charismatic leader, with the gift to gab”, a simplistic reading of the Bible, human nature that does not want to “work for knowledge/wisdom” and a lack of scientific/rational education, and an American culture that is focused on “marketing/branding/entertainment”, what do you get??
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elastigirl,
A couple of unhappy new year’s thoughts:
* my observations are probably a bit out of date as I have been detaching from the Ev movement for more than a decade, but “ends justify the means” can make sense and even seem virtuous to people if the “end” in view is “avoiding something that is much worse than the harm caused by the ‘means’ “. I’m referring, of course, to the understanding of personal eschatology implied by infernalism, which is the default Ev understanding and central to Evangelical self-conception (the very name references “gospel”, which is understood as the counterpoint to the “bad news” of infernalism).
* Evangelicals value certainty and dislike nuance and mystery. This is not a recipe for epistemic humility. This isn’t surprising — given the view of personal eschatology, it would be hard to sleep at night if one did not have a sense of subjective certainty about one’s status with regards to “ultimate fate.” This desire for certainty probably has something to do with the love of apologists who appear to have all the answers and who appear to be able to prove that those who don’t agree are mistaken. (and at that point, “ends justify means” kicks in to motivate one to overlook the character flaws that may be present in the heroic superapostle/apologist).
I don’t think that these dynamics can be easily escaped while preserving the non-negotiables that define what Evangelicalism is.
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Christian Industrial Complex, personality cults, mega-mania, aberrant theology, seeker-friendly Christianity Lite, etc. … the American church is fertile for charlatans … that’s why anything could happen and does.
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Jacob I would agree with your comment about critical thinking not being valued but not about denying most of what science has discovered in the last 500 years.” I am sure there are some churches like that but small in total amount of members.
On the other hand especially in the more mega churches or even in smaller churches where these churches are more like personality cults critical thinking seems to be quite devalued and seen as a threat. This is where “group think” is quite prevalent.
In my reading on cults is that one technique used to help someone leave a cult is to help them learn critical thinking skills. Isn’t that a typical mark of being in a cult where you lose your critical thinking skills?
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Good point.
Do we even see 2 Cor. 7:11 happening with this group and leadership now that the sin of their leader has been exposed.
“11See what this godly sorrow has produced in you: what earnestness, what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what alarm, what longing, what concern, what readiness to see justice done. At every point you have proved yourselves to be innocent in this matter. “
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This is called “‘Science’ Falsely So-Called or WORD! OF!! GAWD!!!”
In my experience, it’s usually found in aberrant splinter churches, not far off from CULTs themselves.
(Though with the Age of Megas, some of those aberrant splinter not-a-Cults can get pretty large.)
Also, Do NOT Trust Christian Cult-Watch groups. They define CULT(TM) entirely by Theological Nitpicking, Not Repeat Not by abusive/control freak behavior towards their people. One of the early ones, Cult Awareness Network, was taken over by Scientology and is now a wholly-owned subsidiary of Scientology.
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Not just “a sucker born every minute” but every millisecond.
Every one of them the easiest of Easy Marks.
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The sages have a hundred maps to give
That trace their crawling cosmos like a tree,
They rattle reason out through many a sieve
That stores the sand and lets the gold go free:
And all these things are less than dust to me
Because my name is Lazarus and I live.
–G. K. Chesterton, “The Convert”
It’s FANSERVICE, a particularly-odious form of Fanservice, Flattering and Reassuring the target audience that “You Are RIGHT and THEY ARE WRONG!”
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“BLUCHER!”
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When you’re not at one of those Superspreader Events in Las Vegas or Christian Concerts in Los Angeles, things can get pretty boring.
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4 comments not approved because i had some difficulty understanding them.
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If you study narcissistic systems you will see that narcissists seek each other out. If you are young, ambitious and do not have the talent to make it to the top by yourself, and most narcissists cannot do that no matter how hard they try, they will look for someone already either climbing to the top or there already and will brown-nose the head guy. They will heap all kinds of false praise on them and butter them up hoping to ingratiate themselves with them and get access to part of the pie. This is how most of their underlings get their jobs. Some plan to make a name for themselves and then eventually leave. Some secretly hope to replace the head guy when he dies, the younger ones. Others are glad to have a well paying job and name recognition. All of this is a political game and how the world system under Satan works.
So I would say that some of the lower level employees were deceived, but most or all of the higher level employees ARE witting accomplices. As long as it was in their own selfish interest to defend the P.O.S. they called a ministry they did so. Now that that is impossible, they are committing mutiny. I have been a lower level employee at VOM and it did not take me too long to see that things were very wrong. I both left because of my conscience and was thrown under their bus at the same time for that conscience. Now I speak out against it whenever I can and have no problem admitting my shame for getting sucked in in the first place. But I see none of that in all of those who are only now speaking out. I would not think it wise to trust or listen to any of them…
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For some reason, these average around three generations before they hit bottom and self-destruct, i.e. “Rags to Riches to Rags in three generations”. Most likely because each generation raises the next, passing on any dysfunction as “what’s normal”.
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Sad news coming out of Missouri: police say that while there was a church connection between the families, their church does not condone the actions taken: One couple convinced another couple that second couple’s wife had a demon. Beatings needed. And oh, the kids inherited the demon so they need to be beaten also. Long sad story short, parents were sexually abusing their little girl with a wooden spoon and (accusations fly as to who did what) the tot wound up in a freezing pond after a severe beating. Both sets of adults have been arrested, other children in the home placed hopefully where they will be safe. The little girl died by drowning. Dad says people don’t understand, that this was a “God thing” going on. Had to defeat those pesky demons.
So incredibly sad, and I have to question what sort of theology was going on in whatever church they attended.
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Ravi’s case exposes an unhealthy pattern in some parachurch organizations and some churches: self-appointed, unaccountable leaders. Anyone can start a parachurch ministry, appoint him or herself as its head, register as a “church”, and begin playing upon people’s most deeply held beliefs in order to gain financially or psychologically. There may even be boards and bylaws but they do not hold the leader accountable in any way…until, perhaps, the leader’s sins are so egregious the board comes to its senses after much harm has been done. The same pattern happens in churches. Unfortunately, I think many people don’t understand the importance of healthy authority structures. Even if they do, they often explain away their absence due to an unfounded loyalty to a leader. Many people in the church look to a “strongman” to lead them, abdicating their own Holy Spirit-guided, Bible-informed discernment due to a superficial understanding of their identity in Christ. The world needs leaders, but in the church we appoint these leaders and hold them accountable as our servants, not our lords and masters.
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That’s probably because you don’t have a correct theological understanding of spiritual truth.
(insert 3000 word treatise here)
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Paul K,
“Many people in the church look to a “strongman” to lead them, abdicating their own Holy Spirit-guided, Bible-informed discernment due to a superficial understanding of their identity in Christ.”
++++++++++++++++++++++
Holy Spirit, the bible, Jesus Christ…. i mean what can i say, other than they’re awesome, amazing… (and even those are piddly words).
but really, the most valuable asset and tool in one’s toolbox is common sense. and intuition, gut feeling, one’s own internal voice.
(which are God-given)
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It is about their culture, not their race. Indeed there are many different races and languages there. The persons making those comments lived there for decades. They are trying to disciple Christians and promote living out the faith in reality. They speak of their popular childrens books that have the good children lying in order to help their families get ahead of others. It is a very different culture. Assuming that everyone knows that lying and trying to deceive others to steal from them is evil is simply not the case in this big world. India is a tough mission field. There are voices inside of it speaking out against all of the deception and greed, but they are just a very small minority. Those that are rich enough to become expats have usually done so by already being more deceptive and greedy than the average Joe over there. This is just the way that it is…
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elastigirl,
Absolutely! And in my opinion that internal voice is one’s own self attempting to keep one safe. If that voice is led by the Spirit and informed by the Bible, it will be a trusted resource to keep one safe. Even for those who aren’t Christians or hold the Bible in high regard, their internal safety mechanisms are something to which they need to pay attention. Unfortunately, manipulative leaders attempt and succeed at overriding our own consciences, especially for those who have grown up in abusive and manipulative families or groups.
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Samuel Conner,
“I don’t think that these dynamics can be easily escaped while preserving the non-negotiables that define what Evangelicalism is.”
++++++++++++++
a lifetime of evangeliworld shows me that evangelicalism is detached from everything other than itself.
it looks down on everyone and everything else under the umbrella of ‘christian’ present (let alone the entire heathen evil worldly world) with kind of a sneer as inferior, suspect, dangerous, not legitimate.
as to ‘christian past’, it doesn’t seem to know it even existed.
it doesn’t talk about what came before it. it doesn’t even realize it’s standing on the shoulders of millenia of others.
as i see it, these things contribute to the small, mini-dimensional, rigid box of ideas, branded as “All The Answers — Yes, you, too, can stop wondering and stop thinking!”. very exclusive. only available at fine Evangelical ‘retailers’.
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Friend,
I applied your comment to a lightly edited version of Danny’s comment.
I, too, have read more than one generalization or stereotype made here in recent weeks. I have also noticed more comments that, to me, just do not make sense. I tend to avoid commenting on these things, as I usually think the issue is with me (given my background and being on the Autism Spectrum).
And yet there are so many other excellent TWW comments I agree with (either in whole or in part). There are many times I avoid commenting on these comments because I am afraid of sounding like an echo chamber.
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“Thou shalt not bear false witness” is one of the ten commandments. Seems like a lot of folks have forgotten that lately. 🙁
Meanwhile in another unrelated matter, fallout from the CRT thing continues and the SBC presidents have been busy digging that hole deeper. https://swbts.edu/news/an-open-letter-to-the-southwestern-seminary-and-scarborough-college-family/
Also, Dee, congratulations on your daughter’s engagement. AND your twitter avatar is superior.
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Only four? You’re way ahead of me! 😉
Happy New Year to you and the furry luggage inspectors.
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There is a level of corruption in third world countries that we in the west have a hard time even comprehending. For instance, news like this that was forwarded to me by my friends: https://cruxnow.com/church/2016/05/police-charge-bishop-was-kidnapped-beaten-by-his-own-priests/
Read it and learn about what happens in RCC churches in the third world. This kind of story is unheard of in the west because in our culture this goes way out of bounds. But in a country where Black Money is so much of a problem that the government has to recall ALL of its currency and issue new because a full half of its economy is underground to hide it from taxation, can we even conceive of that? My contacts tried all the while to find anyone who would rent them a place to live without paying half of the rent under the table to cheat the government. They could not find even one over the decades of being there. The problem is not that there are no real Christians there who see these things as wrong, they exist and some are on their payroll. But the people doing that because their consciences work will never become rich enough to get a Visa to enter the US. I know this as I am married to a foreigner who made $125/month overseas. India is even poorer than her country. Just do the math and follow that. Reality is not racism.
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IMHO: every country on Earth is a “tough mission field”. The human heart is a tough mission field, no matter how it may be camouflaged with, for example, evangelicalism or apologetics, etc.
also IMHO: regional differences around the world translate to different moral dilemmas, yet moral dilemmas are everywhere.
“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” – Leo Tolstoy
What was it like to be a missionary & then return to the USA? We humbly faced our native cultural challenges (darkness), having been out of the loop for a time.
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Like a cartoon version of Islam, endlessly citing “IT IS WRITTEN! IT IS WRITTEN! IT IS WRITTEN!”
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Which is why it has to be denounced as Worldly, Fleshly, and Satanic.
Lukewarm weaklings relying on the Flesh instead of The Spirit.
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Isn’t that the Hindu & Buddhist concept of “Maya”, i.e. “All Reality is Illusion”?
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Groups surrounding Tibetan lamas and rinpoches have had similar issues with sexual assault over the decades. I’d note, for example, the controversy surrounding the Shambhala organization and its leaders Chogyam Trungpa (d. 1987), first successor Osel Tendzin (d. 1991), an American Buddhist, and Trungpa’s son Sakyong Mipham. All three violated various Buddhist precepts regarding chastity and engaged in sexual misconduct. Also, Sogyal Rinpoche (d. 2019, author of probably the most famous translation into English of the “Tibetan Book of Living and Dying”) was also credibly accused of extensive sexual abuse. He died before the issue could be resolved, but denied it up to his death.
That said, the FPMT appears to have acted quickly once it got the report. Dagri Rinpoche has been permanently removed as an FPMT teacher. (He had been suspended in May 2019.) https://tricycle.org/trikedaily/dagri-rinpoche/ Based on what I was able to glean on a quick review of the FaithTrust report, I suspect that Dagri Rinpoche is going to end up on the Dalai Lama’s “bad list”, but, as was the case with the Shambhala group, this guy is probably still going to have a following. That said, I believe the last round of trouble with Shambhala has seriously damaged the organization in a way the previous scandals did not. One of their senior people, Pema Chodron, retired from the organization a year ago due to the sexual abuse scandal.
This is probably a lot more than you wanted to know, but seriously, sexual abuse in religious organizations is *endemic*.
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There are also those who are NOT faking it.
True Believers causing the same damage.
They are often the more dangerous because they’re NOT faking it.
In my church (RCC) claiming Private Revelation (usually some form of “Mary Channeling”) is the characteristic way to go off the deep end. (With Evangelicals it’s some form of Bibliomancy or End Time Prophecy.)
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I’m hearing other people say this (the end is near), but people always have, haven’t they? I personally do not see it but that isn’t saying much. My view: it was ever thus. What we are going through is only particularly disastrous relatively speaking- in our lifetimes. My grandparents lived through the 1918 pandemic, and we have had far worse plagues than this down through history. Medical advances in the late 20th century lulled us into thinking that NOT having plagues was normal. 9/11? What about Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or even the overthrow of the temple in 70 A.D. Honestly the only thing going on right now that seems really and truly different is that the icecaps are melting and we’re having increased natural disasters because of that- something unfortunately many other Christians believe is either not happening or inconsequential. (I’m not sure what benefit is to be had from continued denial since oil stocks are already in the toilet, but whatever.)
All this said with caveat that I’ve never really known what to make of the temple discourse. It has always seemed to me that the things Christ said would be signs are things that occur on a semi-regular basis anyway. On the one hand he says that when we see these kind of normal things occurring, we’ll know the end is coming, and on the other he says that we’ll be caught unawares and should always be ready.
So probably like a lot of other folks I throw up my hands and say, OK, I’ll try to be ready but I’m not gonna hazard a guess about when.
Which brings me back around to John MacArthur (everything seems to lead back to him these days). Not only is he still preaching covid denial, he is now preaching THE END TIMES ARE DRAWING NEAR, which he has actually never done before. I guess he’s abandoned his previous pre-trib rapture position. Very shrewd of him to do this at the end of his career. Not only will he probably not live long enough to repent of his covid denial, he probably won’t live long enough to be proven wrong about his timing of the Second Coming.
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Cult Awareness Network was a secular cult watching organization that got bludgeoned into submission by the Scientology litigation monster. What CAN was trying to do is not comparable to the average Evangelical with a checklist of who is in and who is out. CAN was trying, and similar, more recent organizations, like Steven Hassan’s “Freedom of Mind”, are trying to work with secular definitions of cultic organizations.
Far too often, Evangelical Christians (and others) only define a cult as “someone who doesn’t believe like us” and fail to look at the markers of coercion that exist within their own organization. I’m going to be blunt here: You can have the most orthodox righteous theology ever, but if your organization ticks the boxes for (using Hassan’s BITE Model here) behavior control, information control, thought control and emotional control, then it does not matter to me if your theology is correct. Your organization is a cult.
And based on that, I’m convinced there are little cults everywhere. These are led by charismatic leaders who may think they are so very, very orthodox, but who control their followers in ways that would be recognized as abusive if their theology wasn’t so very, very orthodox.
I think we saw a lot of cultlike thinking emerging from very orthodox churches who decided they knew better than anyone else when it came to COVID-19. And people have died as a result. 🙁
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My end-time eschatology has boiled down to this: when Jesus comes, I go.
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The point I was trying to make was not so much that “the end is near”, but what will it take to get the church to behave as it ought? Terrorists, natural disasters and pandemics hasn’t caused the people of God to humble themselves, pray, repent and seek God’s face (at least in my neck of the wood). It’s been pretty much business as usual, except for those wise ministers and ministries which have taken a pandemic pause in obedience to government authorities. Jesus will bring it all to and end sometime (no man knows the hour) … in the meantime, we need to occupy until He comes – you know, behave like Christians, don’t fall for cheap grace, and don’t chase every man with a new movement.
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Muslin, fka Dee Holmes,
I COMPLETELY agree….. the real irony isthat so much of Christ’s teaching were in parable form.. the OPPOSITE of cult “control” thinking..
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Indeed. And when I put my lil hand up and say my own church is rather healthy, it looks like I too am claiming a Lock On The Truth.
Or as if I were claiming no true Scotsman.
Or as if I too were blinkered and brainwashed.
BUT………. Christianity is going to be around for awhile. It makes sense to remind folks that healthy outposts exist, and places can be reformed through hard work.
I don’t think it helps people to assume that every single church in the world is full of abuse.
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Some comments are more mystical, some more nitty gritty. Folks here feel quite free to bash away at people who have a fleet of aircraft, a history of malfeasance, etc. I think overall that TWW commenters are capable of critical thinking.
But this is kind of hard. Let’s say a pastor has a congregation of 10,000 people, and TWW readers first learn his name after he walks naked down Main Street. We are going to believe the story because TWW is reliable. We’re probably also going to make some assumptions about people who support him because they “know his character,” as well as members who decide not to leave his church.
We readers should do more than pile on the condemnation, but it’s hard to know exactly what to do. By understanding dysfunctionality, we can protect ourselves and maybe heal from old damage. Ideally we prevent future abuse, and protect and heal others.
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Got it. Eschatology for the rest of us.
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What severely bothers me are the people (men and women) in leadership in these organizations who write and are going to write “prophetic” think pieces and tweety tweets about all these scandals without any self awareness or self reflection whatsoever. They should only be delving out apologies or stay quiet and nothing else.
Would it take scandal #48595958 to get you to look in the mirror and your place in the system and how you got there? Because scandals #1 – #48595957 weren’t enough? When so many things go wrong around you how do you not have a serious conscience check and start to lose sleep and immediately wonder if you’ve been part of the problem?
I know that the reason is that to question the system is to have to question the self. It is a huge blow to the ego and identity and where they get their supply to see that maybe the systems they are in aren’t exactly merit based and it is possible that maybe God isn’t really behind any of it. To realize that in order to get *yours* it came at the expense of a ton of other people. It is a lot to overturn and give up.
But it is not *prophecy* to stand in front of destruction and describe the charred wood, blown out windows, shattered glass, and smoke and say deferential things like “See…look at the shattered glass that came from the blown out windows. This happened because xyz. And do you see the charred wood that used to be siding and floors? Let me describe all these in detail for you.” Um yes…everyone see it and knows why its there thanks lol. It is like when The Gospel Coalition puts out cringey articles on the danger of celebrity culture while they are a main source and enabler of celebrity culture and the dangers of it.
No one needs you to tell them because the answer and insights to all these scandals and systems, they have been here the whole time. It comes from the people who were warning for decades and years and who got pushed or thrown out for doing so. The insight has already been given. There are already social psychologists and sociologists or religion who can read all their mail in five seconds. We don’t need you to write think pieces and hold conferences on what people of integrity and foresight have already been saying and seeing.
Their words and think pieces don’t come as a result of suffering, shunning, internal work, and from the quietude of self questioning that takes years to cultivate and unearth. You can’t simultaneously benefit from the systems and then try to get supply from pretending to critique them while still directly benefitting from them. That’s just the same problem that caused the enabling and looking the other way in the first place. Just going with whatever is the popular thing to do at the moment (commenting on overdue scandals) rather than doing the inner work and building a solid sense of self to figure out what went wrong and why.
Is it too much to ask them to put down their opportunism and narcissism for five seconds? (I know the answer is yes.)
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… what is sometimes wrong with the “helper” industries that collect from (“counsel”) the “victims” (who are actually witnesses or evidence) and then the “helper” NEVER reports the predators. Predation as a growth industry.
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*I’m not referring to people like Max Baker-Hytch and Carson Weitnauer who are tangentially affiliated with RZIM as speakers. They provided self-reflection and apologized and laid out facts. That’s good and different and grounded in reality.
I’m talking about the evangelical celebrities and leaders pretending to be some wise sage and oracle that everyone just needs to hear from on these matters.
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I still think he has dementia or something similar. The stuff he’s said lately is so contradictory to his earlier beliefs and more than a little bit off his rocker. And he’s become so anti-medicine that it makes me even more suspicious.
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Ava Aaronson,
Yes. And I think this goes with a popular saying I see a lot (I don’t know who originally said it) “You can’t heal in the same place that made you sick.” And you can’t trust a God or leaders who both caused and instigated your suffering and then position themselves as the only source of healing and cure. Those can’t go together.
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ishy,
You might be right. Regardless I wish he’d retire already.
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Max,
Sorry to go all end times on you when you didn’t mean that.
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I’m so old, Succy, that I often say things I didn’t mean and mean things I didn’t say. I suspect you are younger than me – sorry that you and the other Wartburgers have to put up with an old guy’s ranting on TWW. Respect old age; it’s your future! 🙂
Whether or not these are the “end times”, these are our times and we need to be about the Lord’s business while we have breath … with an ear to the road to hear what the Lord is saying to us through the events in our lives and around us.
Happy New Year, Succy!
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But he’s still packing out his church! Strange isn’t it?! (I think a lot of those folks just show up to hear what he’s going to say next)
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Headless Unicorn Guy,
I agree that most of the examples in your last paragraph are usually, sadly of the kind you say. This is because “receivers” don’t understand the intuitions they are getting, don’t understand the meaning of Scripture, and don’t understand what may have been a different kind of case before.
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I dropped out of three in a row in five years
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Such joy for you and your husband, your mother, and your precious daughter and her future husband. Thank you for sharing, and praise to God for His many mercies and gifts to us.
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This is a difficult topic to address without a high risk of being badly misunderstood. None of us are really aware of what our own cultures consider unacceptable until we are confronted with the norms of a differemt culture. There are things we Americans value that are considered highly offensive in other cultures, and vice versa. After having lived in different cultures, I am less surprised that different cultures place different values on things such as truthfulness, theft, integrity, tact and, and a myriad of other traits which we assign value. If in fact RZ came from a culture that values dishonesty, it is not at all inappropriate to bring that into the conversation. But I don’t personally know of that is true of his particular culture. One would need to investigate that culture before making claims one way or another.
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Southern California is now the Nation’s epicenter for covid-19 infection rate and ensuing death…
And it’s not just MacArthur, the LAPD has busted more than one ‘secret’ New Year’s Eve gala-bash held in out-of-the-way warehouses and industrial properties. Party-goers were packed in like cattle, mostly the mid-20s to mid 30s in age range.
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From Dee’s post:
…did anyone in the Zacharias family know, or turn a blind eye to, Ravi’s involvement with other women?
Jack Hyles daughter talks about her experience,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJsOlLqBEyo
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One place to look at to start is black money in India: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_black_money
I have been on KP’s case for over five years and have learned a lot since I foolishly gave to a crook. I can show you the church money he raised for little churches in villages used to build great big expensive buildings in the wealthiest neighborhoods. I am not pulling things out of thin air…
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I appreciated reading your weighty and challenging reflections on this post You may be interested in David A. Hollinger’s historical to present day look into different aspects of Christian missionary work. I found him to be a very intuitive curious writer and historian and he addresses the good, the bad, and the ugly as you did in your comments but in his own way. To give you a sense of who he is here is an excerpt from one of his essays.
Additionally, I have in mind Danny’s comment “Also, I’m surprised at some of the comments making broad generalizations about Indians and stereotyping based on this case.”
“In these comments for HistPhil, I want to describe the strengths and limitations of traditional, faith-affirming missionary scholarship, and to indicate how scholars outside that tradition—such as scholars of philanthropy—can make collegial contributions to our understanding of the role of missions in American and world history. I base these comments in part on my experience in writing Protestants Abroad: How Missionaries Tried to Change the World but Changed the United States (Princeton, 2018).” Professor David Albert Hollinger
I am attaching links for you. What I do on long essays or reads is I open my laptop’s Immersive Reader/Book View and turn on Read Aloud (the fun part is the speed and voice selection) and busy myself with whatever is before me. (My little hint is to give all the techno wizards and speed readers here with quick comprehension skills and no wee hour eye strain problems a little chuckle.) The last two links are obviously listen and/or view capable already. The religious content may or may not be pertinent nowadays to a precursory NSFW making this SFW because present circumstances keep us at the house!
Additionally, I have in mind Danny’s comment “Also, I’m surprised at some of the comments making broad generalizations about Indians and stereotyping based on this case.”
https://histphil.org/2019/12/09/mission-to-the-missiologists-the-protestant-foreign-missionary-project-and-the-history-of-philanthropy/
https://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/2018/01/29/missionary-children-taught-empathy-americans/ideas/essay/
https://newbooksnetwork.com/david-a-hollinger-protestants-abroad-how-missionaries-tried-to-change-the-world-and-changed-america-princeton-up-2017/
https://www.c-span.org/video/?430393-4/roundtable-discussion-protestants-abroad
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Your comment is nuanced, but the original point was something like “foreigners are bad, my pal said so.”
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They do get disciplined if they try to leave the church or they start not showing up.
This pattern of cult behavior in hypercalvinist churches is such a clear sign of their inability to survive without force.
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Yeah, I’m thinking in particular of a woman on Twitter who fancies herself an apologist and uses her cultie checklist to bash “progressive Christians” and others. (Currently she’s going after a popular Catholic priest and calling him a heretic.) That said, she got into the apologist gig by listening to Ravi Zacharias for a solid year when she was doubting. Now she is walking very carefully through the minefield of acknowledging his influence but saying that RZ was not her lifeboat, but that truth (=Jesus?) was her lifeboat. What this apologist woman does not do is question that maybe what RZ taught her and what she’s learned since then hasn’t helped her. And no, bashing other Christians because they don’t check your boxes is not helpful, ma’am.
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You know, the beauty of the Internet is that they broadcast online and you can listen to their crackpot nonsense from the comfort of your home. In your jammies. With a cup of hot chocolate.
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Yes, that’s the safe option, because if you used anything stronger you might think you were hallucinating.
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I’m wondering if it’s this woman who has her own channel on youtube.
She’s crafted more than a few anti-progressive vids:
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=alisa+childers
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Muslin, fka Dee Holmes,
Yep. I know who you are speaking about. And I have already seen a couple articles and a ton of tweets from others. There are a handful of names I can think of who always feel prompted to turn out a special article that says the same thing. It happens every time on cue. I guarantee you Ed Stetzer is going to write something like “What We Can Learn From the Ravi Zacharias Scandal” if he hasn’t already. I am still mad about that #churchtoo conference he helped put on at Wheaton. It looks like he may not have written that book on sexual abuse in the church like he said he was going to a couple years ago?
Since Ravi’s influence is so huge (even though minus the spa workers allegations everything else was known for years and right there and none of them cared) and it has come at the end of a long string of public outings..I am predicting it will prompt a conference to talk about the danger of Christian celebrities featuring celebrity Christians and close associates as speakers.
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… because, … because … celebrities.
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If I have heard correctly, Cult Awareness Network was taken over by the Scientology group due this Network losing a lawsuit by the Scientology Group. Thus were able to take over the group and change what as posted. I am sure they took down anything that even criticized Scientology. Sadly this take over shows what a group with large pockets can due and sounds similar to what Zacharias did to silence the one person.
One the definition of cults Janja Lalich who is closely associated with Steve Hassan talks about her own experience of being in a political cult. Cults don’t have to be religious groups and as you indicate religious groups can be cults while still having all the right religious doctrines.
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emily honey,
“I am predicting it will prompt a conference to talk about the danger of Christian celebrities featuring celebrity Christians and close associates as speakers.”
++++++++++
but of course. opportunity knocks.
what kind of scientist can dissect and publish a study on evangelical celebrity, the elements and structures that created it/enabled it/fostered it, the motivations, the fall out/consequences, etc.? a sociologist?
is there a sociologist in the house?
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Muff Potter,
ah yes. the one who allegedly blocked steve baughman a few years ago when he presented information that was inconvenient. i guess now is a more convenient time to open her eyes.
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elastigirl,
I like Peter L. Berger. He was a Lutheran and also a sociologist.
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Jacob,
he died. i was going to give him a call.
any other sociologists who would have an interest in publishing a study on evangelical celebrity nonsense-with-consequences?
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Yeah like, at least asking “Hey Dad, why are you in the spa business?”
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elastigirl,
Berger had plenty of ideas relevant to Evangelicalism. I am not a student of sociology beyond having read a few books. Some might find Berger interesting. Here’s an interview I picked almost randomly that he did a few years ago.
http://thecresset.org/2014/Lent/Thuswaldner_L14.html
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Jacob,
i read it. then i watched it on youtube (it was interesting to hear him say it all in his way of talking.)
(it’s a slow day, delightfully so)
didn’t touch on celebrity, but it was all very interesting. how the idea that “modernity results in secularization isn’t true. the result is actually pluralism.” and other really deep things.
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elastigirl,
Glad you liked it! Berger was interesting – he wasn’t really an Evangelical in the American sense of the word, but he was sympathetic towards it while also being critical of some aspects of it. What I have read from him I enjoyed and thought it was insightful. I have a list of his books I have intended to read but haven’t gotten around to it.
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P Berger blows the one-dimensional Durkheimism, which state and religious organisations adhere to, right out of the water.
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Yes, that’s her. It does not appear that she has any educational qualifications (nor does she boast of any). She used to be a CCM singer. Oh, she did appear in the Calvinista “American Gospel” film. She can call herself an apologist all shew wants, but she spends most of her time attacking other people who do not share her particular set of beliefs. This is unhelpful (and I’m being super-nice about this).
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You mean like “Reflections: A GC2 Summit on Responding to Sexual Harassment, Abuse, and Violence” did for sexual abuse? This was led by Ed Stetzer, held at Wheaton, but if you look it up, it’s hit the bit bucket and what’s there NOW is the 2019 conference: “GC2: FACING HARD TRUTHS & CHALLENGES OF PASTORAL MINISTRY”. Which I’m pretty darn sure didn’t even begin to touch on what happened with Ravi Zacharias.
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On New Year’s Eve, Megan Smolenyak, historian and professional genealogy researcher, shared a story of an immigrant who came through Ellis Island. “Let’s hope that 2021 is the year when we once again welcome immigrants.” she wrote. Viewers of Henry Louis Gates, Jr.’s “Finding Your Roots” see her skills in action.
She begins 2021 highlighting another aspect of this field of work. (Smolenyak is also a sought after resource for criminal investigators.) “Sex abuse Aid workers who fathered children abroad are tracked down with DNA”
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9106197/Researchers-uncover-British-foreign-aid-workers-fathered-children-abroad.html?fbclid=IwAR1vMYOgHSSlgNi9A8AV-bgY17-CInwnXd9RpogOGgeSRCP40U2hYoXM0DI
The USA Church’s Ravi Zacharias International Ministries should be on the radar screen of lawyer Andrew MacLeod’s Hear Their Cries team.
From the article:
“After lobbying governments for decades, Mr. MacLeod – who has previously held senior positions at the UN – said that he is yet to see any ‘meaningful change’ within the industry.
But said he was optimistic the new technology can help to hold the perpetrators of the abuse to account now that he has ‘all the tools’ at his disposal.”
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Muslin, fka Dee Holmes,
This is an interesting issue because in her anxiety to “oppose cessationism” she undermines critics of the very same tendency that is on “both sides”.
The Bethelated-Torontulated crew impose solely the “gifts” they want imposed (for their image) while the dry-as-dust brigade pretend there aren’t any (except theirs as heavy handed “pastors” / “teachers”).
Both ways, they are rationing. They are lording it. They are failing to discern the Body. They are denying Holy Spirit living. They are shallow. This dynamic has long been far more noticeable to me than superficial variations in a “charismatic” spectrum.
It got so that I felt too weak to stand up to either – identical – kind. NAR = Neo Cal = hysteria / mania, I’ve seen them all combined together, the effect is always to disfranchise the man in the pew from even basic relating.
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There isn’t a religion on Earth that will honestly engage with inconvenient facts that conflict with a certain shtick held by said religion.
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I agree. Most of her shtick via youtube vids is long and rambling and she will not engage with commenters who push back, unless, as with Baughman’s case, she needs to do damage control.
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Let me guess…
The Holy Spirit(TM) is educational qualification enough?
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The Money and Fame were Too Good?
And even asking such a Forbidden Question would dry up the gravy train?
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And every morning, drive-time radio announces a NEW all-time record in hospitalizations and deaths, breaking yesterday’s all-time record. Which broke the all-time record of the day before, which broke the all-time record of the day before…
A lot more than one, and not just LAPD but all over the southland to San Bernardino and Riverside.
“EVERYBODY’S GONNA GET COVID SOONER OR LATER! AND WE’RE YOUNG AND IMMUNE! PARTY! PARTY! PARTY! PARTY! PARTY!”
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DON’T YOU GO HAL LINDSAY ON US, MAX!
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That’s a scary thought!
See my response to Succy in this regard at:
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Headless Unicorn Guy,
Ironic that this was a favourite poem of RZ that he quoted often. How sad he didn’t see that his straightforward testimony of salvation, lived out through a transparent Christian life, without all the deceit and jabberwocky, would have been a great gift and service to the Kingdom (“They triumphed over him [Satan] by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony” Rev 12:11).
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Dad would have made a great Witchfinder-General in The Burning Times.
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If this guy is the one I think he is, he was both a Hyper-Calvinist AND Rapture Ready Dispy.
Which struck me as one of the WORST possible combinations.
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Remember the two bloodiest cults of the 20th Century — Naziism and Communism — were POLITICAL Cults.
We’re also seeing a political cult situation in the news right now, touched off by the 2020 elections.
Which is why all those Christian Cult Watch groups during my time in-country weren’t worth an overripe turd.
All the Christian Cult Watch groups defined CULT entirely by Doctrine and Dogma, not repeat NOT by cultic control-freak behavior towards their people. Which is why groups like Koinonia House Christian Felloswhip (the cultic splinter church that ripped my head apart) kept getting a clean bill of health — while the Cult-Sniffers were parsing Theology letter-by-letter, abusive groups not only sailed in under the radar but actually used their Not-A-CULT certification as one more weapon against their pew-sitters.
Didn’t hurt that the Christian Cult-Sniffers has the exact same Theology as these Not-A-CULTs: Rapture Ready Fundagelical Dispy.