“I want to make a statement about…me…now, if I became deceived, I will never tell you what I’m going to tell you now…I am telling you if I go off into strange ideas, misconduct, rebellion, you name it, don’t follow me. I want to tell you that now, because if I start doing that I’m gonna try to get you to follow me! I’m gonna come to you and tell you it doesn’t apply, it doesn’t mean me, no, no, no, no, no, no, it’s OK to follow me because ABCD and XY and Z. Do you understand what I’m saying? Listen to me now, when I tell you don’t follow me if I go off into weird ideas, or if I get off into other things that are total absolutely unscriptural conduct, because if I do I’m gonna paint it with a different face and try to get you to follow me. Do you understand what I’m saying brethren? Please remember that, because I promise you that if I become deceived, I’ll forget it, and I’ll want you to forget it…And I hope you’ll remember it well enough to quote it right back to me…But I’ll tell you what, I’m not going anywhere.”
-David C Pack
December 12, 1998
The Clarion Call of Apostle David C. Pack
Video and audio files can be found here and on Rumble
In other words, in his own way, Herbert Armstrong was a groomer, who made his son into a profligate loser in much the way he was. Many who have grown up in the Armstrongist churches of god have faced both the double standards and the doubts pushed on them by their parents. Many of them have ended up confused by the utter chaos: The facts don’t match the beliefs, but one under this sick administration have to live as though the lies are the truth which makes for a very weak direction in life with integrity and ethics completely compromised.
GTA was just one example of this. Unfortunately, he was given exposure and power to continue this dysfunctional echo chamber in his own version of distorted perception.
There is a explanation of a proverb from a minister of the WCG now long gone: Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it. His explanation turns the traditional one on its head: If you let a child grow up the way he wants (without restraint and without self-control), when he is old, he will not depart from it — lacking the fortitude and without the proper background to manage life successfully. This is the basis of mental disorders and, worse, the foundation of sociopaths and psychopaths. Others simply remain victims, some of which are trapped into poverty, at the mercy of various social programs on which they must depend for their continued existence.
GTA is an example of failed training by a man devoid of morals, but he is only one example of so many who have been victimized by an entire system of abuse bounded by an echo chamber of unfounded and unsuccessful narratives, leading to generations of misery.