To be honest, I'm not quite sure what to make of the initiative taken by Joe Sanchez, a member or former member of COGWA. He basically seems to be advocating openness and accountability in matters of church discipline. Unfortunately, on his new website one of the significant PDF links that might add some further clarity, a letter to COGWA's doctrinal committee, only brings up a 404 message. Hopefully that'll be fixed. In an email sent today Sanchez writes:
After years of seeing the same results time after time, I have come to the conclusion that the majority of the division, controversy and injustices in the church of God can be traced back to a total and complete lack of transparency by the ministry. Although we may not agree in all areas of religion and theology hopefully we can all acknowledge that if the ministry was required to be transparent in matters of controversy, it would be a significant overhaul that would prevent a lot of the corruption we have all seen. I have been a first hand witness to seeing genuine Christians kicked to the curb like a piece of trash as well as sexual predators given a haul pass. These acts have only been possible because of a lack of transparency when these decisions are being made!
A couple years ago I sent in a paper to the doctrinal committee of COGWA asking for scriptural evidence for their current system. I was shock by how little biblical support the ministry has for justifying operating in secret. All of this correspondence is available on my website at http://tothechurch.org/
Please take the time to review my site and please share! Any help exposing this system for what it is would be much appreciated!
Any call for transparency in decision making is obviously a welcome one. Sanchez seems to be networking with a small number of others, including Jonathan Reimann, in this effort to bring about a change from within the organization. It may be a worthy goal, but I don't much like his chances - though you certainly have to admire his tenacity.
9 comments:
It's not going to happen. It is just not in their dna. I've said many times that the leaders of all of these groups are incapable of recognizng and repenting of the sins of HWA. Anything the old man did is considered fair game, despite our changing times and the public calls for transparency amongst corporate types, police departments, and charitable organizations. You really know you've got a deeply institutionalized problem when you have a poster (several months ago on another site) share a personal experience in which he was conversing with his local minister, and commented to him, "I agree with you!" and the minister harshly reprimanded the man for having evaluated him. And of course, what recourse did the man then have? Phrases like "Lake of Fire", names like "Korah" and words like "disfellowship" would have been used if he chose to push his point further. Some of the ministers could really use a good sore jaw!
BB
Any COG can register with CHARITY NAVIGATOR so that we can see their Financials.
Like the dreadful CGI did, and we can see Shirley Armstrong's big salary and
their abysmal ZERO-out-of-Four star rating LOL
Transparency? You mean like the Wounded Warrior Project?
It shares an awful lot with Armstrongism and maybe the Armstrongists can learn a thing or two about manipulating their members and their public image.
Although, as it is with most things of this type, there does seem to be a shelf life and sooner or later there's going to be those who blow the whistle, not that whistle blowers get much respect and put themselves in a great deal of danger when it would just be better to acknowledge the group is totally dysfunctional, leave and move on.
After all that is said and done, it's probably not worth the effort, since the group isn't worth saving anyway.
News Flash---
LCG & COGWA MERGING!
New acronym will be...
CLOGWAD ;-)
If either Joe or Jonathan are currently in good standing in their splinter of choice, they won't be for long if they keep this up. Asking tough questions, especially ones that are begging to be asked, will not be tolerated for long...
Joe here.
I have been asked several times of what I hope to gain through this effort. Although I don't expect any immediate results I am hopeful that some may ask more questions especially when they are confronted with similar situations. I know that this site an others like it have addressed these issues multiple time and have gotten zero results. However I am taking a different approach that MIGHT reach some.
I know many on this site may think of members of the COG are ignorant and stupid, and to a degree I will admit it is true. I assumed that the ministry was some what more spiritually mature, they were much more wise than myself and they had real scriptural support for why they made many decisions in private. Well after multiple encounters dealing with sexual predators and invalid suspensions I learned that these assumptions were incorrect. And then after I sent in my study in to COGWA's doctrinal committee and got their reply I learned that they have no scriptural support for making these in secrecy.
I know these revelations may seem elementary to many, but coming from someone who still believes many of the teachings of the COG's, it is significant.
If you want to reach someone who is currently in the COG's it isn't going to come through some allegations from the 1970's or through some rumor of misconduct- it is only going to take place by showing them the scriptures that emphatically show that the leadership has to be transparent. I have tried to do that.
By the way, I did fix the link. Thank you Gavin for pointing that out.
Why all of the HWA bashing. At no time did God claim that any of His followers, prophets, or apostles were perfect, or that their belief system was sound. "Let him who is WITHOUT SIN cast the first stone." A renowned Jewish Rabbi Hillel was once challenged by a Gentile. If he could condense the Scriptures into a sentence, then the Gentile would convert, to which the Rabbi responded: "Love God and what is abhorrent to you, do not do to others. All the rest is commentary." The same is true for us today. The Bible clearly shows that we are to love God above all else, and to treat everyone else as we would want to be treated. All of the rest is merely history and personal opinion. Christians - "true Christians" - will not force their ideas or opinions upon anyone else, but will live by their personal moral code and demonstrate its benefits to others through their actions. It is this fanatical, fundamentalism - or religious militancy - that will give rise to the "king of the south" - militant Islam - the "king of the north" - militant Christianity, and the "people of the east" - militant communism. Live by your own beliefs and do not force them upon others. If you want to read about TRUE Christianity, Email me and I will send you a copy of my manuscript.
D Parker can be reached by Email at: derekkparker1@gmail.com I would be happy to send anyone a free copy of my manuscript.
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