Did you know that there is a group of Sabbath keeping Mormons?
Certainly, the Armstrongists do not have a lock on claiming to keep the Sabbath as a part of keeping the Ten Commandments as a part of keeping God’s Law. Certainly, there is the Church of God, Seventh Day — several of them, in fact — so many of them you might not be able to keep them straight. There is the Seventh Day Church of God, which not only keeps the Sabbath, but has kept the Holydays since 1919: They took notice of Gilbert G. Rupert early on — long before Herbert Armstrong was taught personally by Jesus Christ to keep them [the author hopes that those reading this have a finely honed sense of irony]. [In case you are wondering, and do not have access to the Herald of Truth, Paul Woods produces the Holyday Calendar for the Seventh Day Church of God presently.] There are also those who actually don’t much deserve mention, such as the Seventh Day Baptists and the Seventh Day Adventists. In a totally illogical way, these two groups manage to keep the Sabbath (?) and Christmas and Easter — and to the Armstrongist mind, that’s just wrong.
One wonders with all the claims and counter claims of those keeping the Sabbath, and some of them managing to declare themselves holier than thou in spite of some nagging inconsistencies in their actual practices, just how deep the sincerity of committment might actually be? As one, myself, who lives on a good example of others, it certainly gives me pause to observe people coming into Sabbath services with an obviously fresh latte they just purchased at a drive through; it gives me pause to hear talk of their plans to eat out immediately after services and long before sunset, at Denny’s, Sherri’s or something even more upscale. There are those disturbing accounts in Ezra and Nehemiah about related commercial enterprises, after all.
Now mind you, Grace Communion International, A.K.A WCG, if only they could get the State of Washington to recognize their name change, corporately speaking, really doesn’t have a problem. Any day and every day is good to worship the Lord and spend time with him. Last Sabbath, Larry Pate pointed out while giving a sermon on I Thessalonians that we should have Jesus Christ as our Lord. It was his perspective that in the old Armstrongist Worldwide Church of God, it was far too often that the Law was our Lord, not Jesus Christ. Even if I don’t agree with the Grace Communion International, I have to admit that Mr. Pate has a point.
Nevertheless, this is not a discussion of religion, per se. It is not a discussion about theology. It is not a discussion, even about the Sabbath, per se. This is about hypocrisy. Let me just say that the examples that I see among all the Churches of God — and not just the Armstrongist ones — is a tad disappointing. I don’t care myself if you keep the Sabbath or you don’t keep the Sabbath. My concern is about people who claim to keep God’s Law, the Ten Commandments and claim to keep the Sabbath, and, yet, offer irreconcilable contradictions in their practices.
I’m not the only one to wonder about this issue. Art Bradic and Dennis Fischer coauthored a book called “A Sabbath Test” where you can find over at the Eternal Church of God Website: http://www.eternalcog.org/ecgbooks/stdirectory.html Their approach was just to lay out the case that we should not engage in commerce on the Sabbath by eating out on the Sabbath — if we’re going to keep the Sabbath, anyway. Their approach is something like: we’re comrades at arms, spiritual brothers — we’d like you to consider this. It isn’t in the typical Armstrongist take-no-prisoners, you’re-headed-for-the-lake-of-fire, cut-off-from-God approach. But for all that, the reaction, particularly amongst the ministers and leadership of all the major Armstrongist Churches of God is nothing short of astonishing: Everyone of them is vehemantly opposed to the Bradic / Fischer approach and have universally condemned them for their efforts. Dennis Fischer documents this fairly well over at his website: http://www.blowthetrumpet.org/HonoringGodsSabbath.htm
There’s stiff opposition from United, Living, Restored and the Church of the Great God. John Rittenbaugh, Director of the Church of the Great God, declared that the authors of A Sabbath Test were, at minimum, demon influenced, if not outright possessed, making that conclusion without reading a single word of the text.
It was just a few years back, three or four, I think, if I remember correctly, that Dennis Fischer told me at Sabbath services at the UCG in Redmond, Washington, that many of the brethren were beginning to consider the questions brought forth in the booklet. At the time, he was good friends with Dennis Luker and often gave Bible Studies in his own home. The leadership in Cincinnati, as they do, set forth to study the issue. Usually, such commissions to the Council of Elders drags on for years, what with their bureaucratic processes of governance and all, but this time, the retribution decision was as swift as it was decisive: Dennis Luker [the next president of the UCG, presently packing his bags] had to tell Dennis Fischer that even though they were friends, well… you know…. Bible studies in Mr. Fischer’s home soon were dropped mysteriously from the UCG church schedule and finally, he moved away to Montana, to be in more direct contact with Art Braidic and the members of the Eternal Church of God there.
United, for sure, uses the ad hominum argument that Art Braidic has done something which would prevent them from allowing him to be a minister in the UCG. I would like to remind the UCG that they have some much more dirty laundry in their closet which I disclosed a while back and their performance was less than stellar. I paid the lawyer’s fees for the stalked couple and I sat in the courtroom after all. I really don’t think that United has any cause to cast the first stone, so to speak, but, then that’s ancient history, as is the events which they recount in United concerning Mr. Braidic. If they’d like to use that as an excuse, then they probably don’t have much to say about the coauthor. What a bunch of hypocrites.
But there’s more.
There wasn’t just opposition. There were excuses. Can you imagine how many excuses the Armstrongist Churches of God could possibly give for breaking the Sabbath by eating out in a Restaurant? Would you say 5? 10? 20? 25? Nope. Thirty excuses. As my friend Wally Hensen in the Seventh Day Church of God says, “If you need an excuse, any one will do”.
I am well known for being that take-no-prisoners, in-your-face approach to hypocrisy. I’d probably be fighting along side the Maccabeean brothers. If you remember, the last thing I said to the Armstrongists, particularly to the UCG, was: judgment, if any, awaits. I figure that after all of those years of being yelled at as being evil and wicked and made to sing Psalm 51 year after year at the “Passover”, while considering that great and perfect stellar example of the ministry and the Armstrong lead Worldwide Church of God — and the even worse judgmental Radio Church of God — it is high time that the Armstrongists get a taste of their own medicine, particularly since they seem caught up in their own self-righteous narcissistic universe. It is something they long richly deserved.
On the other hand, is the kindness and gentle, if not genteel, loving approach of Art Braidic. He just wants his brothers in the church and ministry to have the blessings of God.
I plan to see Art Braidic this September in Montana. I might even consider singing The Holy City again at the Feast after a four year hiatus from the Red Lodge site. And I have a question for him — albeit a rhetorical one: Just which approach has worked with the leadership and ministry of the major Armstrongist churches of God — mine or his? We all now know the answer, but it will be fun to ask just the same.
Speaking of the Feast, has anyone considered that $832+ and on up to $1,552 cruise out of Seattle to Alaska, offered by the Church of God, Big Sandy? They meet the first two days of the Feast of Tabernacles at the Edgewater Inn in Seattle. On Friday afternoon, they board the Holland America Cruise Lines ship, the M.S. Zaandam, arriving at their first port of call in Juneau, Alaska that following Sunday. Services will be from 8 to 9 AM daily except for Wednesday, September 29th, when services are not planned. The Last Great Day will aboard ship as they arrive in the evening in Victoria, B.C. Canada. Sounds fun. Not too much religion at one hour per day — but it is awfully early. And on the Sabbath and the Holy Day, the manservants and maidservants of the Holland America Cruise Lines will be at your beck and call to cook up and serve you anything you want. Even if you choose buffet, the Captain and First Mate are in the wheel house on the Sabbath and Last Great Day, sailing the ship. The Church of God, Big Sandy, as you recall is one of the 40+ churches split away from United, and the CoG, BS is growing a lot faster and have a lot of fun programs (like the Boy Scouts) for participating members. One wonders if Ezra and Nehemiah are rolling over in their graves.
The CoG, BS cruise is reminisent of the single’s United Cruise down to Mexico. On the Sabbath, the ship was in port. Most of the members went out on the beach to go parasailing, while the minister hid on board ship. I’m guessing that the UCG has to keep the fun stuff for the 20 somethings to keep them interested, keeping the Sabbath be damned. …and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play. Or maybe United is a bit closer to the Grace Communion International folks than we would have surmised. Given United’s recent woes, the time may be ripe for some sort of corporate merger — if only the Chairman of the Board can somehow be persuaded to embrace less conservative values.
Beware of the leaven and all that. Like so many corporate sociopaths, they’d like you to accept what you are told and go your way. I have for the past 2+ years [and had great peace, finally walking away from the Armstrongist cultists], but every once in awhile it’s good for folks to have a reality check again — particularly with people we all know are about as far from reality as their high concepts can take them. They can hearken back to Herbert Armstrong, but I’ve had side conversations with his personal chef awhile back and as sure as death, taxes, revenge and the fury of a woman scorned, cannot, for the life of me, understand how anyone can claim to be keeping the Sabbath while demanding that his man servant cook something up for him on the Sabbath because he has a hankering for some food morsel or other. Perhaps, someone should do an investigation of what ever happened to that peacock on the AC campus. Delicious, was it? Cooked on the Sabbath? We wouldn’t wonder.
Meantime, I’m just as puzzled as ever: The claims about keeping the Sabbath make no sense at all — the behavior and bad example confuse me. The excuses anger me. If you’re going to keep it, keep it; if not, just give up making any claims about it.
I just had a thought: I wonder if I could find some Sabbath keeping Scientologists to visit. It makes about as much sense.
Next week: Disappointment, Part 2: Stench.
I suppose you can get caught up in all that, and I certainly hope Mr. Becker finds satisfaction in what he is doing, but the simple fact is, they’re all wrong.
That’s not just the various WCG splinters, but all religions, period.
Pointing out the various legal flaws in their reasoning on the sabbath may open an eye from time to time, but the fact is, there are people who need to believe in something that sets them apart.
This can have many causes. First, there is the schizotypal personality that PurpleHymnal mentions, then there is the fact that we live in a very mechanically oriented culture that seeks to reduce everyone to the level of non-entity, then there’s the feeling of simply being out of control that accompanies our present economic situation.
For me, however, it boils down to very simple and basic conclusons.
1.If you try to package truth in any single package, it will ultimately tend toward a splintering and speciation of packages. This is demonstrated in Godel’s theorem.
2. This very process is confirmed in Romans 8:7 which states that the carnal mind is enmity against God and cannot be subject to the laws of God.
The logical result of (2) above, is that every single attempt to organize by God’s laws by developing mechanical frames of reference MUST result in exactly the same tendency toward an infinity of ideas and beliefs regarding God.
Even if every other social/cultural point of contention were eliminated, you would still end up with infinite splintering of ideas because you cannot escape the consequences of Godel’s theorem.
AND, even if you reject the “laws of God” in favor of the “Holy Spirit” of the New Testament church, you STILL are forced to using the very mechanical, axiomatic processes of reasoning that lead to infinite splintering in the first place.
This means, quite simply, that all religions are WRONG.
Lets give Mr. Douglas Becker a hearty welcome here at the Painful Truth Blog as he exposes the hypocrisy that is so prevalent in those so called churches of God!
Love him or hate him, Mr. Becker has always been the one lone voice that cries out in the desolate camp of Armstrongism, the hue and cry that shakes Cincinnati to its core!
Applaud Mr. Becker for his efforts to continue on, exposing the churches nephelococcygic delusions that attempt to take the memberships eyes, ears, mind, and spirits from them.
Ralph, it isn’t even about religion. It’s about hypocrisy.
Corporations and government has exactly the same problem: The party line never matches performance.
One of the things I face right now is that where I work is in crisis. The Deputy County Executive is in a very difficult situation. He is determined to get rid of the IBM Mainframe by November 1. He knows that the County is breaking State law by overcharging their customers to the tune of $700,000+ per year. The State Auditor is coming in January. It’s panic time because the State Auditor has just whapped the State Service Center upside the head because they were overcharging their customers and the Auditor made them stop. Now the big guns are coming and Kevin really has a problem, and he should know, because he used to work for the State Auditor. The County wouldn’t have this problem if it weren’t for the two Managers directly under the IT Director who manage 85% of the people and are married to each other in clear violation — at least my attorney tells me so — of the County rules against conflict of interest. It turns out they’ve used the money from overcharging the County for years to build their own little private empires — doing a great deal of damage to the County. They’ve had a fine time: We’ve spent $10 million for a security system we don’t even need and for which there was no request for proposal, no project, no plan, no requirements and no support. Every occassionally, County workers are locked out of their buildings because the system fails. The First Family of IT has also managed to replace an email system working perfectly well for $4 million — one for which they keep spending money because, well, they just didn’t foresee those little things like archiving and spam filtering which come up. And by the way, the husband hacker hobbyist, throwing his requests for servers over the division wall to his wife to provide for him, didn’t even graduate from college when he got his job. He’s not really qualified to manage — his girlfriend cum wife got him there. Except for the name on the door, you’d think this was an Armstrongist Church of God. It should be noted that my psychiatrist thinks they’re all crazies at work. So to the Deputy County Executive I say, good luck!
Don’t narrow yourself to just flail away against religion. Everybody should get what’s coming to them, not just those with narrow sect thinking. Want to solve the problems with BP in the Gulf? How about medicare and Social Security? I merely picked a religious venue — albeit a very narrow one to prove my point:
I don’t claim to be right; I only claim that everybody else is wrong.
And it just seems to me that even if I can’t put my finger on it, there’s something wrong with your line of thinking. It will probably come to me in due time.
Anyway, this is just the beginning, and I have four more posts — one a week in July; coming up: Stench, Lies, Delusions and Rats.
After that, I’m going back to anonymity. I am doing this as a favor to my friend, James. The hastle of dealing with Armstrongists and ex Armstrongists just isn’t worth my time. I have better things to do, like fleshing out my knowledge of C# in Visual Studio and learning all about .net and .aspx to deploy it to my websites.
Mr Becker, I agrree wioth you fully. The same human brain that created religions, created governments, so they stand to have exactlt the same flaws, which I explored with Stan earlier regarding the Constitution.
For example, in the constitution comon law was reserved exclusively to the states because all matters invlving life, liberty, and property were reserved to the states(Madison, “Federalist #45”).
Under the 5th amendment, NO person may be deprived of life, liberty, or property but by due process of law, and due process is specifically defined by several justices as COMMON LAW, over which the federal government had NO general jurisdiction(see St George’ Tucker’s commentaries).
Blackstone trells us that the common law is supreme over ALL civil law, which includes admiralty, corporate, any religous law.
So, if common law is sovereign over all law, and if the federal government had no jurisdiction over comon law, buit the states did, then quite obvioulsy the STATES WERE SOVEREIGN.
ALL forms of civil law are subiordinate to common law, and NO PERSON can be dperived of life, liberty or property but by due process, which is clearly defined as COMMON LAW, NOT Constitutonal law, as Hamilton himself points out in “Federalist #78”.
What does this have to do with your statement? It points out that hypocrisy is plainly and provably practived in al forms of government, whether of church or state, and the individual is free of ALL such garbage.
Ralph, do beware, not to fall into the trap of [ex]Armstrongists — which is sort of the corollary of Albert Einstein looking for the Grand Unification Theory of Quantum Mechanics: The unfortunate undesirable endless search for an explanation for everything.
I take my cue from my cat. Mama can tell him that she’s going to sit down with him — in a minute (more like 20 minutes). Mama’s going to get your food. The cat looks up with his pretty blue crossed eyes as if to say, “When?”. He’s pragmatic. Either it is or it isn’t. As a finely honed predator, maybe his eyesight isn’t so good, but there’s nothing wrong with his sense of taste and smell; his hearing is stellar. His standing question, “What’s in it for me?”.
Armstrongists and now ex Armstrongists are trapped in the, if you’ll pardon the term, paradigm, of some truth or other which explains everything. That can be Sabbath, Holydays, clean and unclean meats, what is godly or not, the length of skirts and hair, what positions for sex are appropriate, atheism, Godel’s Theorem, New Covenant, Old Covenant, Arianism or… and the list goes on and on.
Me? I’m too busy doing real things, like feeding my cat, figuring out how to install my split heat pump without putting a three inch hole in the apartment wall, balancing my checkbook, keeping up with submitting my medical expenses to be reimbursed out of my spending account, trying to keep Payroll / Personnel and Budget / Finance running on the IBM Mainframe at work in face of rather crazy management in a totally dysfunctional environment and… the list of things goes on and on.
After walking away from the Armstrongist environment, I found new freedom. I will cover it in future posting, but the freedom from the lies and dominance of less than competent ministers and administrators who are headed for spectacular failure has provided a lot of peace. I found I no longer have to adapt my whole life to satsify the narcissistic sociopaths and psychopaths of the churches of tin plated godletts caught up in their delusional self importance of British Israelism and the pyramid inch. Miserable comfortors were they all. But it was worse than that: They gave spectacularly bad advice — or ignored me altogether — during my time of greatest need. In effect, they killed off my brother. They were quite unhelpful with my mentally ill children. And they never gave me any support or comfort at all. Criticism? Well, that was another matter.
It’s just best to walk away after causing ministers and administrators a bit of pain they so richly deserve. It works to improve chances for sanity. My financial picture is a lot better than ever. I don’t have to worry about some nut case making his idolatry my own to please him for no particularly good reason — and certainly no benefit for anyone but him. I don’t have to listen or read the lies any more.
Unfortunately, each of us has taken away some of the toxic poison ideas with us upon exit, and we don’t really realize it. The distortions remain. It took me quite awhile to REALLY eliminate the residual thinking of British Israelism. It’s harder than it looks. A headline here; a news report there…. And some times, it is less than useful to take the exact opposite tack from the Armstrongist high concepts, because it forces a person to plunge right back into the cesspool of dysfunctionality. Don’t think about a pink rhinocerous in the bathroom for the next two minutes, huh!
So you might want to adopt my cat’s pragmatic perspective. I have three basic questions to answer:
1. Does it work?
2. How well does it work?
3. Will it work in the long run?
An even more important question is, is it relevant?
I take the Dr. Gregory House approach: Everybody lies. It’s just that for many reasons, we may not be able to point out the emperor has no clothes. Losing your life isn’t worth it.
These days, the Dr. Lightman Fox Network “Lie to me” TV Series, as empowering as it may seem, doesn’t turn out like we’d like it to: “Lie to me and you WILL regret it”. It’s more like: “Lie to me and I will regret it”.
As we all found out, we can expose the truth, but we may find ourselves having our websites being taken down and being sued. It’s like sticking your bare hand into a live hornet’s nest.
At least, in theory, we should be able to escape, but it’s harder than it looks.
T%hat’s trhe point of Godel’s theorem. There is no overall paradigm to which we can put everthing. The stateent is simple enough from a layman;s perspective: in any consistent axiomatic formulation of number theory, there exists an infinity of undecidable propositions.
Doesn’t matter whether it’s math or logic, if it is suffiently complex such that it can become self referencing(as humans are), it will lead to an infinity of undecidable propositions.
Let’s look at your 3 questions in the light of my own presentation:
1.Does it work? Yes, since from ancient times, the common law was accepted as the right of the people to decidee any issue in thelight of that issue and only that issue, making it highly pragmatic(like your cat).
The right of trial by jury and jury nullification, as stated by Chief Justice John Jay, who also contributed to “The Federalist” stated, it is the right of the jury to decide matters in law as well as fact.
2.How well does it work? As well as human minds acting in response to specific actions can be expected to work. But it does require certain basics. The individual has the right to do as /she wishes, as long as s/he harms no one else, the individual has the right to the presumption of innocence(common law, also Isaiah 54:17). Right to face your accuser(common law, also Isaiah 50:8), Right to at least two witnesses for any offense, right against perjury, right not to accuse yourself, etc, all of which belong to common law and the bible. These are ancient and basic principles of simple common sense.
3. Will it work in the long run? It is the only thing that can work in the long run. As to the commericla/civil laws by which your county government operates, common law takes precedence, always has. We just haven’t been told that.
Douglas Becker, thanks for this post. Your advice in one of your comments to “just walk away” is good. In fact, if people can bring themselves do it without “causing ministers and administrators a bit of pain they so richly deserve,” even better. However, I understand the psychological need to do so and do not condemn those who satisfy it.
Your current state of being “too busy doing real things” reminds me of Ecclesiastes 9:11: “Go thy way, eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with a merry heart; for God now accepteth thy works.”
It also recalls the end of Voltaire’s *Candide.* After years of harrowing and ultimately futile attempts to prove Pangloss’s contention that this is the best of all possible worlds, Candide finds himself and his companions Dr. Pangloss and Martin enjoying the hospitality of a Turk who feeds and entertains them richly. Candide guesses the man must have a large estate, but the Turk says he owns only twenty acres, which he and his children cultivate.
“This good old man,” said [Candide] to Pangloss and Martin, “appears to me to have chosen for himself a lot much preferable to that of the six Kings with whom we had the honor to sup.”
“Human grandeur,” said Pangloss, “is very dangerous, if we believe the testimonies of almost all philosophers; for we find Eglon, King of Moab, was assassinated by Aod; Absalom was hanged by the hair of his head, and run through with three darts; King Nadab, son of Jeroboam, was slain by Baaza; King Ela by Zimri; Okosias by Jehu; Athaliah by Jehoiada; the Kings Jehooiakim, Jeconiah, and Zedekiah, were led into captivity: I need not tell you what was the fate of Croesus, Astyages, Darius, Dionysius of Syracuse, Pyrrhus, Perseus, Hannibal, Jugurtha, Ariovistus, Caesar, Pompey, Nero, Otho, Vitellius, Domitian, Richard II of England, Edward II, Henry VI, Richard Ill, Mary Stuart, Charles I, the three Henrys of France, and the Emperor Henry IV.”
“Neither need you tell me,” said Candide, “that we must take care of our garden.”
“You are in the right,” said Pangloss; “for when man was put into the garden of Eden, it was with an intent to dress it; and this proves that man was not born to be idle.”
“Work then without disputing,” said Martin; “it is the only way to render life supportable.”
The little society, one and all, entered into this laudable design and set themselves to exert their different talents. The little piece of ground yielded them a plentiful crop. Cunegund indeed was very ugly, but she became an excellent hand at pastrywork: Pacquette embroidered; the old woman had the care of the linen. There was none, down to Brother Giroflee, but did some service; he was a very good carpenter, and became an honest man. Pangloss used now and then to say to Candide:
“There is a concatenation of all events in the best of possible worlds; for, in short, had you not been kicked out of a fine castle for the love of Miss Cunegund; had you not been put into the Inquisition; had you not traveled over America on foot; had you not run the Baron through the body; and had you not lost all your sheep, which you brought from the good country of El Dorado, you would not have been here to eat preserved citrons and pistachio nuts.”
“Excellently observed,” answered Candide; “but let us cultivate our garden.”
(I take time to write this comment because right now it is raining, and too wet to work in my own garden.)
You do realize, of course, that cultivating your own garden has a metaphorical meaning?
Why, whatever could it possibly imply besides tilling, hoeing, and weed-pulling?
Surely you wouldn’t suggest that the meaning could extend to scattering seed, fertilizing furrows, or irrigating with a hose!
It could mean taking care of your own family and affairs and not worrying over other people’s “gardens”.
Doug, welcome to the blog. It’s good to have someone willing to put out some helpful points for discussion. Like you, religion has become rather irrelevant to me.
I put no stock in either religion or politics anymore. They are just two systems embodying dogmatic thoughts and principles that seldom add up to real solutions or guides for life, economics or anything else. Our founding fathers were very wise to keep the two separate, but it’s a steady battle to maintain that separation.
I’m so glad the bastards canceled out my department back in ’74 and forced me to wise up and start thinking straight. The struggle of life didn’t stop then, but I was able to step back and begin looking at things honestly. Too bad it took so long, but most of us don’t really mature until sometime in our thirties and forties.
Looking forward to your comeing posts.
Al,
I have followed Mr. Becker’s writings for nearly a decade. No one, and I mean no one has come close to understanding the decadent churches of god like he does.
As to my opinions on the churches of god, I will say that in the genesis of the Churches of God’s undertakings, Herbert begat corruption, which begat the ministry, which begat the membership, that close their eyes, cover their ears and put tape over their mouths, which will eventually begat judgment if there is to be one.
I can attest and say that the Churches of God have a very good attribute in their willingness, and with happiness and joy in their hearts, to cause the destruction of human ambition and enjoyment for this life. Given time, I must ask, will they have success in creating an ideological climate that will enable them to create a membership sunk in the most abject superstition, fanaticism, poverty and ignorance?
The answer from among them might prove to be as difficult of a task as explaining the difference between flirting and sexual harassment, between white lies and perjury, or between a schoolboy carrying a butter knife and carrying a switchblade.
The Churches of God. Why does everyone hate them? Maybe we never stopped to think that it’s because they are pertinacious sandbaggers when we first encountered them. They are a pertinacious sandbaggers now. And there is no more reason for believing that they will ever cease to be pertinacious sandbaggers.
Lastly, I can’t end this note without mentioning that the Churches of God are a spiritual syphilis that has now reached the tertiary stage, paresis and insanity.
Please someone tell me, where can we find the spiritual penicillin to cure the body, or is it too late?
I think the greatest worth of this blog is being able to sample the accumulated knowledge and insights others have to offer. I value all of you and appreciate the time you take to share, and yes, I even appreciate the redundancy of repetition because we tend to forget some of the simplist things.
I did not mean to say I sought revenge. After all, doesn’t Scripture say, “Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord”. No, it’s more like, things lined up and it just happened. I find that the most amazing things do occur — things which you wouldn’t think would or even could. I often find out things that people are deliberately hiding from me. I shouldn’t know about them, but somehow I find them out.
One example is Dennis Luker becoming UCG president. That was just a fluke that I found that out. Another is the fact that another minister in United has taken forward my information about rational recovery and preaching about it in his congregation, whereas just 38 miles away, a more prominent minister was preaching about [carping, really] about support groups. In fact, the minister putting forward rational recovery mentioned that support groups could also be an addiction!
I’ve roughed out most of the rest of the articles. I’m having difficulty about the one about lies, but I think I have it straight now — I just have to finish it.
My approach is and always has been, presenting information I think should be helpful to people. I’ve always figured it’s not about me, it’s about people who can be helped. There are so many things I’ve done that people will never know.
One of the problems here, especially with this particular entry is that nearly every paragraph has a book’s worth of material behind it. At best you only get the smallest of glimpses. These days, that the way of things. We’re now limited to what? 240 bytes for Tweets?
I’ve worked with Mainframes now for 41 years. I do try to be compact, but sometimes it’s better to say nothing than to dumb it down for the attention span deprived.
Not trying to put anyone down, but you can get so cauht up in details to prove a point that you challenge this little point and that little point…Reminds me of the old saying that when you’re up to your ass in alligators, you forget that you came to drain the swamp.
That’s why I like Godel’s theorem, pick a human system of organization, any system, government, religion, even science. Bang, Godel’s theorem says it’ll never unify truth. Done, finished, over. There are no human authorities, and if they say otherwise, they’re provably full of crap.
So, why pick at the intricacies of law? Because the morons of the world who run your life actually think there’s something about human laws that makes them more subject to obedience than imaginary laws of God. They honestly believe they ought to be obeyed, when in reality the only thing that gives them authority over you are those not so smart uniformed guys with guns. That’s it, that’s all.
Back when I was a mere 24 years old, I learned I was free from all human authorities, church and state, and having to put up with some moron telling me he has the right to stop me on the highway, when common law going all the way to Blackstone and Coke of England says if he stops me for any reason, however long, it’s imprisonment, for which he can be charged with assault and battery, I really get the urge to slap a few arrogant people.
Not only that, (are you reading, Stan?), any law that give general permission for a cop to stop a person without probable cause is a general warrant, prohibited by the 4th amendment. This US government is violating your rights by the handfuls.
I said what I said in the original posting of Hypocrisy because it amused me and I thought it was funny. It’s also original, and you don’t see that much in Armstrong land any more.
Anyway, if the Armstrongist Bozos are claiming that they keep something they don’t really do, they should be called on it.
I thought Sabbath keeping Scientologists was a nice touch. How irrelevant and ironic is that?
I’ve finally roughed out the last four entries and they are in post production. That’s good because, in the immortal words of Jeff Goldblum in the Movie, Independence Day, “Time’s up!”.
Concerning rights, debtor’s prison is back folks! Modern corporations and lawyers now have a process that can land you in jail for unpaid bills until you pay bail — which is exactly equal to your outstanding debt. In some cases, the police will arrest someone without even knowing what the charge is, so to speak, if you’ll pardon the pun.
If you owe, you can be arrested, no matter what you are doing, and it is probable that you will spend at least over night in jail. I’ve seen the debt range from $89 all the way to $3,500. It could be any kind of bill, from an unpaid utility [although, they’re more inclined to just sieze your property, sell it and evict you], to credit card debt, to hospital debt.
Here’s but one example:
“In 2009, the New York Times reported on Edwina Nowlin, a poor Michigan resident, who was ordered to reimburse a juvenile detention center $104 a month for holding her 16-year-old son. When she didn’t pay, she was thrown in prison.”
I want my habeas corpus!
I’ve said for a long time now that the robber barons, beginning under Reagan and company with their trickle down “voodoo economics” nonsense got back in control of the country and am not a bit surprised that something like going to prison over a debt is back in vogue.
We have let everything that great men like Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, etc. fought for get steadily eroded away. In the interim, our great industries have been exported overseas while the fat cats amassed their billions, ran roughshod over everybody else and have effectively driven the middle class to the point of extinction. I really fear for the future my descendants face.
Al,
Politics aside if I may use that as a pun, it was the Democrats that were in charge as they picked yours, mine, and hundreds of million of other Americans pockets in their quest for the great society.
If you are to make a political statement, before you do, ask yourself who created the trillion dollar lock-box bullshit story as to your Social Security benefits.
Jobs are created when the incentive is before those who have the means to do so. Face the question with honesty. Would you create jobs if your tax liability is 76% and would be reduced to 24% if you created jobs? Hell yes! That is what Reagan did.
As a few of you know, in my past, I was a former communist. I know communism when I see it. I smelled it, I ate it, and in the end I puked it out.
The solution is not the state. It is not your god and neither is it your religion. I AM the solution. Not anyone else.
As too the debtor prison issue, yes it is back. A judge issues you a decree when you are sued by say a credit card company. The judge who sits in the seat of Moses gives you an ultimatum to pay your debt or face jail for contempt of court. You have two choices here and you should choice carefully what you are about to say.
First choice is to agree to pay (outside the bankruptcy option) and the second depends if you have anything left to lose.
This other option is not recommended but I will give it to you here in case you find yourself in a desperate situation.
You can chose to tell the judge to go fuck himself and get thrown in jail for thirty days and still have the debt that you must pay on release. The nice thing about this option is that you will get free meals, free health-care or dental care if needed, and if you find yourself needing to have sexual reassignment surgery, well I am sure the taxpayers will be more than happy to pick up the tab.
Dexter, the real problem seems to have begun in the 1920s when lawyers persuaded law makers to allow corporations to become “legal persons” to limit the liability of stock holders. After that, such things as corporations able to hold patents on personal DNA followed.
Let’s try a thought experiment to test the theory that allowing the fiction that corporations are legal individuals is the major cause of modern problems by taking that power away from them. What would happen in that scenario?
No more corporate patents or copyrights. Actual living people would hold them and be accountable for what happened with their use. Corporations would not have the capability of suing people and each other. Conglomerates would not take over national refuges to pump oil out of the ground. It would be individuals and groups of individuals who could be thrown into prison when their actions resulted in the deaths of thousands, rather than disolving the corporation, selling off the assets and forming another one. It also MAY be possible to prevent shell corporations to shield the mafia, drug cartels and other scoundrels from being all but invisible from scrutiny. And speaking of scrutiny, it might be that there would be a lot less of it.
The downside is that we might have to return to lives a bit more simple. We might have to return to an agrarian based society like we had prior to 1972.
Of course, that’s not the entire problem. Jihadists taking down the twin towers of the Trade Center in New York, September 11, 2001 also transformed the landscape. Islam is the fastest growing religion in our prisons. And why not? It gives the blacks in prison a feeling of empowerment they have never had before. Today — today — in Pierce County in the jail, Moslem converts are insisting that they have their own space in jail to wash and say their prayers 5 times a day bowing to Mecca. Part of the result of that is that Corrections has told the Chaplain’s office that they can’t even hint about teaching about the Bible or Jesus Christ in jail. Furthermore, the Chaplaincy is all but destroyed because the Tacoma Rescue Mission is pulling out from providing the service. Moreover, volunteers, such as the son of the member of the local Church of God Seventh day has been told that he cannot teach about Jesus Christ or say anything about the Bible. He told them to forget it, he’s not volunteering any longer. The correction officers are afraid of the Moslems in jail.
Behind the scenes, a great many people are turning to Islam. There are now 400,000 Moslems in the State of Texas. Several of them are former Baptist ministers. Other states are reporting the same thing.
The thing about Islam is that no Moslem may say anything negative about those who promote it in any way. That is why you don’t hear any protests by the Islamic community in any way about September 11, 2001. No apologies. No outrage. Nada. And yet Islamic leaders want everyone to believe that Islam is a peaceful religion. Read the Koran, especially about the choices there are for other religions to live in peace and cooperation with Islam.
As if all THAT is not enough, consider the drug cartels and the Russian Mafia. We have the Russian Mafia in our neighborhood. Their children are a scourge in the schools here and make getting an education a rather dangerous enterprise.
Liberal spending by liberals at the Federal level to the tune of Trillions of dollars isn’t helping much. The liberals have done what all psychopaths do when they take over: Destroy the credibility of those who might be able to thwart their programs — in this case, the conservatives have been made to look to be bad clowns who are coocoo nuts, while the liberals push through inititives which are difficult to be seen as anything but fiscally irresponsible.
Of course, “nature” isn’t helping much. Nor is the carelessness of major irresponsible corporations.
Take your pick which is worst.
And then think of a strategy of turning things around. If you have a practical workable way of doing that, you’re a lot better, smarter and wiser than I am, even if people would listen to me, which they won’t. As bad as it is, people don’t want things to change so they can fulfill their lusts, so maybe we should put the blame on the people where it really belongs. After all, these days, they generally won’t take responsibility, but will certainly whine when things go wrong.
I’ve been preaching about corporations as legal person having due process protection since the late 70s.
But here’s the thing: since due process is defined as common law, and no branch of federal government has jurisdiction over common law, who has the authority to give corporations due process protection? Nobody.
The other point is that the courts no longer operate under due process as common law, but under admiralty courts, which is merely a subsidiary under the authority of common law.
The colonist detested admiralty courts because they were purely administrative and allowed no jury. You walked before the judge, the complaint was made, charges read, and you were sentenced to whatever punishment. Under common law, the jury legally acquitted the defendant for the very simple reason that common law demanded jury trial, and any trial under other authority was always subject to common law.
In England, common law was the SUPREME law by which legislation was fashioned. Civil law, or “corpus juris civilis”, having come from Rome and therefore alien to English law, had no authority over common law. The code of Justinian and all those civil codes so praised by lawyers today HAVE NO AUTHORITY OVER COMMON LAW!
So, here’s a simple constitutional principle: If the federal government was given no general jurisdiction over common law, as St George Tucker and other legal historians state, and if due process, which was common law, belonged only to the states, by the plain statements of the 5th and 14th amendments, NO PERSON can be deprived of life, liberty or property for ANY reason, unless they are tried under common law. That’s what the constitution tells us, that’s what Blackstone tells us, that was the law as understood by the founders, and Hamilton, in promoting the Constitution, wrote: “In strictness, the people surrender nothing, and as they retain everything, they have no need of particular reservations”.
But just in case there was any doubt, the 5th amendment was added, which Justice Sory called an enlargement of Magna Carta, which Blackstone said was recognized as common law.
So, federal government had no jurisdiction over due process, and under the 14th amendment, neither do the states. So here’s the big Constitutional question: By what authority do corporations claim due process protections, being strictly created by either federal or state laws?
Answer: They have no constitutional authority whatever, since common law pre-existed constitutional law, and the people surrender nothing by accepting a federal constitution.
Douglas, I share your feeling of futility. Our doom was sealed when the Federal Reserve was set up through subterfuge and intrigue. The Bankers own us all, which means they own the country and most of the world. They don’t care who has political power. They are the ones in ultimate control.
Political parties are no more potent than religions while a host of enemies conspire to destroy the great American experiment. That leaves me in a state of hopelessness where the fate of mankind is concerned. Neither the conservatives nor the liberals have the answers. They’re both trying to make a corrupt and fatally flawed system work.
Hopeless? That is a great advantage to the ex-WCG-ers who saw through the crap. There are no authorities, which means you’re as much an authority as anyone else, which means you can stand up to anybody and say “Piss off!”.
You don’t believe in God, you don’t believe in any higher cosmic authority, you know there’s no legitimate human authority, so what prevents you from saying to anybody at any time that if they have any legitimate authority other than the fact that they control uniformed low intelligence gun hands, prove it.
You guys really amaze me. You’re so busy being bitter because Herb screwed you that you don’t see the incredible miracle that occurred as a result. You’re free, damn it! Act like it!
To my knowledge, there is only one man in the history of the US Marine Corps who simply walked away, quit, told them to go to hell, and then in a court martial for desertion, not only won that court martial, but received an apology from the marines and a meritorious promotion as well. I’m that man.
because I’m great? Hell no, because there’s a shitload of people out there looking for somebody to stand up and say “the damn buck stops here!”.
Al, you still don’t believe that part in Revelation about one world economic system?
Ralph, I definitely believe in one world economic system. It’s the reality all around us, but I don’t believe the Book of Revelation has a damn thing to do with it.
Why would you not believe it? Take for example the “wholre of babylon that commits fornicatin with kings of the earth”. The Talmud began in Babylon, spread from there and allowed the Jews, combined with the Mishna, to develop legislation to develop banking systems and notes that represented wealth, loaning at inteest rates for kings of other nations, whom the Jewish banker served quite profitably.
When Wiliam the Conqueror defeated the Anglo-Saxons, he brought with him a contingent of Jews who were quite skillful in matters of law and finance, and who helped develop what England would later recognize as common law.
When Cyrus allowed the Jews to return to Israel, a few returned, and they were financed by Jews who had devrelop profitable trading ventutres atr the outposts of the Babylonian kingdom.
The parallels are so amazing it’s astounding. The book of Revelation had nothng to do with it?
I don’t accept the Book of Revelation as anything more than the rantings of another psycopath. You see whatever you want to in it, as multitudes of others have for centuries, but it’s no more a revelation to me than the Koran would be.
Here Al, get even.
http://www.impeachobamacampaign.com/
That’s pretty plain ravings. One monetary system, one comination of a beast/false prophet, or perhpas Attila/Witch Doctor, as Ayn Rand would say.
Even assuming it was the ravings of a psyhopath or even a horrible military experiment gone wrong, it’s hard to deny the nature of the statement.
BTW, even the Koran has the same prohibitions on wealth and the use of interest as an “abomination”. Strangely, the very system that coalesces into one world economic system uses the very process of economic control and organization that the 3 major world religions declare is evil.
Of course, that doesn’t make any of the religions right. But it is interesting. If a statement corresponds to a constant process, if you see that process building and de veloping in parallel to processes in history, it has the odor of that old saying “If it walks like a duck…”
Just for supposition, assume that the predicitions of a world economic system in Revelation is actually true. Would it somehow justify christianity or Judaism, or Islam? Not in the least. It would priove only that a system was developing as predicted, and that there would be a few people who would resist and refuse to take part in it.
Just for shits and giggles, assuming it were true, there’s nothing about any special doctrine tat would be followed, no specific rules that would allow humans to organize and identify themselves. It simply says there will be a one world economic system, and a few people will stand against it, and they will most likely be killed.
You expressed earlier a sense of helplessness at that very developing system. Sounds pretty much the same to me.
For further argument, it would be impossible to say the bible had nothing to do with the present economic crisis. The reason being that the present usury based system was bult around legistation in trade and commerce developed by Jews, who based their idea on the bible, extended to Mishna, etc.
The fact that christians learned and took over the very same system merely modifies the fact that our present economic banking system is based on preinciles originating from concepts that came from the Torah, which became Jewish law, which spread into christianity.
History itself woud force us to conclude that yes, the bible pretty much has a great deal to do with our prresent situation.
Oh, I agree that the Bible has a lot to do with our present situation. That has no bearing on the fact, as I see it, that it is a ridiculous, concocted farce. The western world would be far better off if it had never seen either the Bible, the Koran or the Book of Mormon.
I have no doubt that Christ, if he existed, had a meal prepared and served to him on the sabbath.
What, with all the righteousness in the UCG, you would think that the leadership would take the course that would cause the membership to jump through some more loops of legalism. Keep them stressed out and unable to meet the goal. Tell them they are not worthy of salvation. And better yet still! Threaten to disfellowship the whole crew! “We will get to the Kingdom without you.”
Hell, it worked for Herbert!
I first became embroiled in WCG, then RCG, in late 1952. I remember hiding out until sunset so I wouldn’t break the Sabbath by riding with them before sunset for the weekly shopping trip to town on Saturday night. At that time the church was a lot more restrictive about the Sabbath. People tried to prepare food ahead so there would be a minimum of labor involved in just setting it out.
Things loosened up pretty fast. By the time I left in the mid seventies, practices had become “loose as a goose.” The limitations imposed by ancient edicts just don’t fit the real world, so it was inevitable that loosening up had to come about.
When one becomes convinced that he or she is worshipping the one true god who created the present world in seven literal days, it becomes imperitive to show respect for that god by observing his sabbath. As long as that fiction continues to fill the minds of gullible people ( yes, I was gullible and stupid), we are going to see this same kind of ignorance and hypocrisy exhibiting in countless organizations.
People try to reduce “God” to mechanical rules and principles that describe reality in “shorthand”. In the Middle Ages, philosophers ought God by trying to imagine how God would make the universe according to laws.
In time, we found that “God” was not necessar to explanations of the universe. And then we tried to justify “man’s” place in the universe as God’s representative. That didn’t work either. But there’s still a place in my soul that cries out to be “good”, not because others approve, but because goodness is how I was created, and how the universe exists.
But you can’t define “good” in any special, single process, any more than you can define “truth’ or “beauty” other than in the eye of the beholder.
But it was that realization, combined with the idea of “God, reason, and nature”, that ultimately resulted in the Declaration of Independence which, if read carefully, is merely the shorthand version of what was known as the common law. Blackstone summed it up quite well, and it was also recognized by bodies of religious folks such as Quakers and Puritans. Blackstone said:
“Let a man therefore be ever so abandoned in his principles, or vicious in his practice, provided he keeps his wickedness to himself, and does not offend against the rules of public decency, he is out of the reach of human laws”.
A person is bound by rules of “decency”. Jefferson also mentioned that:
“When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which ha ve conected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station, to which the laws of nature, and of nature’s God, entitle them, a DECENT respect to the opinions of mankind requires, that they should declare the causes which impel them to separation”.
It was the “rules of public decency” and respect for them, that compelled the Declaration of Independence.
God, nature, reason, and decency. To do what? To be “vicious” or wicked, provided “he keeps his wickedness to himself”. That was the common law, over which Blackstone said the civil law had no authority. That sounds familiar. Wasn’t it Paul who said there is no law against good works? Wasn’t it Paul who said a person was “dead to the law” if he harmed no other? Sounds a lot like common law to me.
Blackstone wrote: “That constitution or frame of government, that system of laws, is alone calculated to maintain civil liberty, which leaves the subject entire master of his own conduct, except in those points wherein the public good requires direction or restraint”.
These were founded on “God, reason, and nature” stated by both Jefferson and Blackstone as the final authority for human conduct.
The right of people to rule themselves, to frame their own government which serves them. “…shall the thing framed say of him that framed it, ‘He had no understanding?'”(Isa 29:16).
Paul called it right. The flaw occurs when humans try to devise the rules by which they are “better” than others, whatever those rules may be. All are merely human definitions. I wanted desperately to be loved by God, to stand for what’s right, no matter what.
As I later discovered, I already am. Don’t need rules or laws. Just need a decent respect for others.
Ralph,
Do you perceive Objective Morality as Common Law?
Objective morality? Do you mean objectivism as stated by Ayn Rand? I agree with that. I think she had incredible insights philosophically and morally.
However, if you look at history after she achieved lasting fame, she had the same clingers, and unquestioning followers, even to the point of talking with a Russina accent and smoking cigarettes in long holders.
Which leads to your discussion on sociopaths, psychopaths, etc, above.
“The flaw occurs when humans try to devise the rules by which they are “better” than others, whatever those rules may be. All are merely human definitions. I wanted desperately to be loved by God, to stand for what’s right, no matter what.
As I later discovered, I already am. Don’t need rules or laws. Just need a decent respect for others.”
Right on, Ralph. It all comes down to expressing a respect and a type of love toward all others. Get that firmly in our character and we don’t need no damn laws.