Was there a Mrs Jesus?

It's an old chestnut: was Jesus married? If so, who to? Now Dr James Tabor, one of the more illustrious WCG alumni, is offering a new argument in favor of the proposition. Tabor takes us back to the earliest Christian writings - Paul's, not the Gospels - and turns the lights up on 1 Corinthians. Why, he asks, doesn't Paul use Jesus' celibacy in his rant about the virtues of singleness?

Of course there are other explanations, some of them more unsettling than others. At the end of the day we know remarkably little about the man from Galilee, the Gospel accounts notwithstanding.

You can find Tabor's musings in his latest blog offering.

All the news that's fit to print

The latest issue of The Journal is out. Highlights:

Pam and George Dewey are hitting the road in a used RV to preach 'n teach, and The Journal poses typically COGish questions: does Pam give sermons? Should a woman be doing this stuff? Pam's replies are, as usual, to the point.

The CG7 splinter based in Meridian, Idaho, gets a mention too. It seems they've got their own unaccredited college. Maybe Rod should send Doc Germano over to see if he can fix them up...

LCG member Thomas Geiger responds to Ronald Dart's inappropriate pontifications on the Wisconsin killings. Geiger is no namby-pamby peacenik himself, he assures us. "... I am a hunter and thus join you as being a gun-toting Christian. Mr. [Carl] McNair was not a pacifist, nor am I, and I would defend my family to the death. I believe that, almost to a man, this is the way the men in the LCG and most of God’s churches are wired." No, the problem, dear Ron, is that there wasn't enough time to respond. Why Dart thought he was qualified to "armchair quarterback" on this issue is a mystery. As for the virtues of being a "gun-toting Christian" - I guess Terry Ratzmann would have heartily agreed.

The Big Sandy Church of God is developing a relationship with the El Salvador dissidents (or true believers, depending on your perspective) led by Herberth Cisneros.

You can read the front and back pages of the issue online.

Saint Ted

Ikons have never been a big deal in the WCG, in fact quite the contrary. So it's nice to know that this venerable piece of religious art endures. And somehow it's appropriate that it was gifted to us by Penthouse magazine.

Yes, this is the lead page to a feature article from thirty years ago, April 1977. My, how time flies. Thanks to Bill F. who forwarded a PDF version of "Reverend Doom."

He’s heard and seen by more Americans each week than Walter Cronkite. His magazine has more subscribers than Newsweek.

The silverhaired, silver-tongued talker is fast becoming an American institution, with far more spiritual clout than that of almost any other religious leader. He is late-night companionship to thousands of truckers, the voice of the morning to millions of farmers, the living-room preacher to a subculture of lonely, frightened, disoriented Americans. He is even better known in Canada, where the airwaves are saturated with his television and radio broadcasts.

Hard to imagine now. Within a year of the article's appearance Ted was fired and disfellowshipped.

But aside from its news reports, The Plain Truth is largely a right-wing propaganda outlet.

Perceptive! Pick up a copy of the most recent GN, TW or Flurry's Trumpet and... snap!

Martin E. Marty, professor of the history of modern Christianity at the University of Chicago, says of the Armstrong phenomenon: ... Sects like Armstrong's probably drain off discontent into harmless channels among people who might be more dangerous without Armstrong's alternative view of history to grasp onto. This kind of religion makes elites out of the ignorant and the poor.”
Religious bromide for the unwary. Marty always was a smart cookie.

So two questions. First, how come America's most lecherous publication was able to see the true nature of WCG so much more clearly than the righteous brethren within (including yours truly)?

And second, do you reckon as a tribute to Dad, Mark Armstrong has a copy of that artwork hanging up in his office at ICG HQ (or failing that, a copy of the current Penthouse in his desk drawer)?

The words of J

Thanks to fellow blogger Felix Taylor for pointing out the existence of a promising new blog on WCG. Shadows of WCG is the work of a former member, and its definitely worth checking out. The writer goes by the handle "J." Well written, perceptive, balanced... great stuff.

Now we need a P, E, D and there'll be a set!

Gilgamesh

A thousand years before the Bible there was Gilgamesh. It's the oldest story that has come down to us from the earliest years of civilization. What is truly remarkable is that, despite the jarring strangeness of the world of 2750 BCE, it is also a familiar world filled with people very much like ourselves. Students of the Bible are usually captivated by the deluge story, this version predating the one that appears in Genesis, but there is so much more on offer.

I was first introduced to the Gilgamesh Epic by sci-fi writer Robert Silverberg's novel Gilgamesh. In my opinion it's an underrated work, and it's good to see it back in print, though it's no substitute for the real thing.

The problem with most translations of Gilgamesh is that they're the work of academics, and often fail to catch the power of the original. Which is why Stephen Mitchell's efforts in providing Gilgamesh: A New English Version are so successful, capturing the beauty, poetry, and yes even the raw eroticism of this tale from the beginning of history.

The setting is Uruk, now familiar to us from newspaper and TV reports as blood-soaked Mosul in Iraq. Gilgamesh is the lusty young monarch who teams up with a wild man known as Enkidu to bring down a monster, Humbaba. It's a tale of friendship, sexuality and death. The cast of minor characters include a sacred prostitute, the priestess Shamhat, whose task it is to bring Enkidu to Uruk.

They looked in amazement. The man was huge
and beautiful. Deep in Shamhat's loins
desire stirred. Her breath quickened
as she stared at this primordial being.
"Look," the trapper said, "there he is.
Now use your love-arts...
Stir up his lust when he approaches,
touch him, excite him, take his breath
with your kisses, show him what a woman is."

And then there's Utnapishtim, the original Noah.

On the seventh day,
I brought out a dove and set it free.
The dove flew off, then back to the ship,
because there was no place to land. I waited
then I brought out a swallow and set it free.
The swallow flew off, then flew back to the ship,
because there was no place to land. I waited
then I brought out a raven and set it free.
The raven flew off, and because the water
had receded, it found a branch, it sat there,
it ate, it flew off and didn't return.

Although the Gilgamesh epic is short (easily read in a single sitting, though I'd recommend you take it a little more slowly to appreciate it's depths) it is without a doubt superb literature, and any thoughtful reader will come away with some fresh insight into the human condition. Long ages before Ecclesiates, Gilgamesh receives this advice from a tavern keeper.

Humans are born, they live, then they die,
this is the order that the gods have decreed.
But until the end comes, enjoy your life,
spend it in hapiness, not despair.
Savour your food, make each of your days
a delight, bathe and anoint yourself,
wear bright clothes that are sparkling clean,
let music and dancing fill your house,
love the child who holds you by the hand,
and give your wife pleasure in your embrace.
That is the best way for a man to live.


Mitchell's version fairly sings, and is the best way to approach this remarkable tale, a journey to great-walled Uruk and the cedar forests of Lebanon, nearly 5000 years in the past.

Moderation in all things ?

The livingcog Yahoo moderator has changed that group's policy, and thusly inspired so have I.

My Livingcog yahoo group is now "closed" rather than public, at least for now anyways. Lurkers were getting posters into too much trouble!
Jackboots and Bibles perhaps? Nothing quite like an Internet heresy hunt. Freedom of speech is obviously a Laodicean virtue in LCG. This group is the most active of the COG boards. The picture is... the moderator's avatar? Looks like a Ron Dart disciple to me.

As of about five minutes ago AW is again unmoderated. However no more anonymous postings are possible, so you'll need to register with a gmail account if you haven't already.

Believe it or not, the first anniversary of this blog is only days away. Only one year? Feels like decades ;-)

Apocaholics and gun nuts

Two items caught my eye in the January-February Journal; one an ad, the other comments from the leader of a major splinter ministry.

The ad provides the title for this posting. You probably have to be as old as me to recognize the name Gary Alexander, another of high profile writers who didn't survive the traumas of the 1970s. Alexander was also responsible for a major booklet on the End Times theme, The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1973).

Alexander's post-WCG career has apparently had it's colorful moments, and I believe you'll find some of the details chronicled in old issues of John Trechak's Ambassador Report. Now Gary is back as a self-proclaimed "apocaholic."

In 1990, I woke up to see that the world is getting better by almost all metrics - and I became richer and happier by sharing this good news with others.

I'm willing to bet from the tone of the ad that ol' Gary is actually trying to sell life insurance or some other plan to make a buck, but I still like the idea of an "Apocaholics Anonymous" group.

The second item was a report by Dixon Cartwright on a gathering of the good and the great in Lexington. While the serfs were amusing themselves at the Winter Family Tournament in December, the elite were gathered at an invitation-only conference. Nothing wrong with that, and the lineup included some of those in the independent wing of the COG movement with a proven record for integrity.

Among them was Ronald N.R.A. Dart.

Speaking of the Brookfield LCG killings, Dart opined: To me, I still to this day can't understand why three guys didn't just tackle him [murder-suicide Terry Ratzmann] all at once.

The former Armstrong evangelist went on: it almost seems like sometimes we've been spiritually castrated.

I have a 12-gauge and a 9-mm handgun in my house, and, if some guy breaks into our home and threatens my wife and me, he will go back down those stairs head over heels
In the wake of the recent killings in Virginia it's not difficult to imagine the opinions Mr Dart will be offering, but I can only wonder if the aging preacher would pause to afix his toupee first before grabbing the gun. I'd wager he'd be far more likely to shoot himself in the foot than face a life-threatening home invasion in his neighborhood. Then again, church members were fueled on fear and insecurity, so maybe it's no wonder if the preachers have fallen victim to their own nightmare rhetoric.

Then there's the ludicrous situation where LCG's Richard Ames jumps in to offer trite commentary on the Virginia tragedy: From Columbine to Kosovo, and from Blacksburg to Baghdad, our world is mired in violence, pain and suffering.

Blacksburg to Brookfield Mr Ames, remember Brookfield?

Beware of flying folders

For the past week I've been struggling with an assignment on the Bible and ethical decision making. The Bible and what? Back in WCG days I can't recollect the word 'ethics' appearing anywhere. I guess the closest thing was the Meredith booklet on The Ten Commandments. I even checked the infamous STP. Ethics are missing in action.

I think most of my ethical struggles in those days - at least conscious ones - were about food. Could there be ham in that sandwich? All the big issues were deferred to the powers that be. One size solution fits all: just do what the church says!

In any case, I've come close to turfing the study guide out of the window more than once over recent days. I'm not sure the Bible has anything relevant to say about ethics at all. The track record of Christians generally is hardly impressive. Lest anyone think the COG tradition is different, remember back to the days of D&R when families were split up.

The Bible can and has been used to promote slavery and oppose slavery, to promote anti-Semitism and oppose anti-Semitism, to promote capital punishment and also oppose it. Prohibition, Sunday laws, military service, you name it. The Bible is a marvelously malleable weapon in anyone's culture war.

In New Zealand at the moment there's a huge debate going on over whether parents should be able to smack their kids (corporal punishment.) As usual the fundamentalists are up in arms, waving their Bibles and quoting scriptures in defense of their God-given right to belt the devil out of their progeny. At the other end of the spectrum non-fundamentalist Christians generally support a change in legislation that would give kids exactly the same protection adults have. It's a debate that has the community cleanly divided, and a lot of tempers frayed.

I notice that Samuel Martin, son of the late Ernest Martin and the guy in the picture, has a book out on the spanking issue. In one of those "isn't it a small world" moments I also noticed that it's been endorsed by my sister's Presbyterian minister. Hmm.

In any case, after a week of hard labor, I at last have a draft up even if it is completely unreadable. Even better, the study folder hasn't ended up in the hedge or crashing on top of the neighbour's cat.

But there's still time, still time...


Addendum: It's been pointed out that the impression might be given that Samuel Martin's book is pro-spanking. Absolutely not, as the link makes clear. I haven't read the book, but on the strength of what's available online it seems to be a valuable contribution to the debate from someone who has some real insight on the issue. If anyone has read the book and wants to provide a review, drop me an email at otagosh@gmail.com

The Wright Stuff

It's the ultimate question, the holy grail of Armstrongism, a mystery more profound than the meaning of life...

What does the 'W' in Herbert W. Armstrong stand for?
There have been false trails. One officially sanctioned story had it that the 'W' was added sometime in the 1940s after mail-delivery confusion with another Herbert Armstrong in Pasadena (wouldn't want those donations going astray!) But a quick check of the Autobiography shows Armstrong was using the initial from the beginning of his journalistic career.

In the 1970s I came across an article called "The Spiritual Wilderness of Herbert William Armstrong" in the Australian Lutheran. Credible? I doubt it.

Now there's a new contender: Herbert Wright Armstrong. Just type the whole name into Google inside quote marks. Who'd dare argue with answers.com or Wikipedia? Yet as far as I know there's no documentation to prove it one way or another. So how did Herb pick up the new moniker? We can probably credit Tammy Roberts.

Herbert W. Armstrong was named after his mother's brother, Herschel Herbert WRIGHT. I speculate that the "W" in his name stands for WRIGHT...Herbert Wright Armstrong, a common practice to use the mother's maiden name as a middle name for her sons. (Tammy Roberts, Genealogy and HWA)

Speculation or not it now seems Herb is to be declared "Wright" regardless, courtesy of the Internet. Considering the energy he put into muddying the waters, one can only imagine that the "discovery", if correct, will have him rolling over in the Pasadena Lawn Cemetery.

And if Tammy has it wrong? Just look at that knowing smile!

The Retirement Dilemma

Thoughts on WCG's responsibilities to its former employees from Byker Bob, posted on the alumni forum, with followup comments by an ex-employee.
Next time you receive your annual statement from the Social Security Administration, assuming you ever worked for the Worldwide Church of God, or Ambassador College, take a look at all of the zeroes in the columns referring to taxed Social Security earnings, and taxed Medicare earnings. Now, picture yourself as one who worked for our favorite two institutions for the bulk of your career. What benefits are you scheduled to receive upon attaining the age of 66?

Here's the scenario. You worked for some organizations which were operating under the strange delusion (some called it prophecy that was revealed to God's Apostle, Mr. Herbert W. Armstrong) that the world was going to end, and Jesus Christ was going to return long before you ever reached the age of retirement. Giving your money to the government, when it could have been given to "the work" was seen as not exercising good stewardship, so the decision was made by senior management of WCG/AC to opt out of the Social Security program, which was their perfect right as a non-profit religious organization.

This has been one of the most far reaching and influential decisions made on your behalf by the church and college. Now that we know that HWA was simply another false prophet, we can see that it would have been far wiser to hold back a little, and to save for retirement, but imagine the reaction of your local pastor if you had even suggested doing this back then! You would have been seen as lacking faith at the very least, or might even have been compared to Annanias and Saphira!

It doesn't matter what we might think of the people who are without retirement at this point in time, because the policy was equally unfair to everyone. Maybe you feel that the ministers who left the church are going to the Lake of Fire anyway, so what does it matter if they get retirement? Or, you might fall on the other side of the fence and assume that all ministers were our Nazi torturers, and regardless as to whether they have repented of their evil WCG roles, still deserve to suffer. But, what about long-term employees who opted to stay with the main body of WCG, and were fired for continuing to keep the sabbath privately in their own homes? What about the people who always tried to do the right thing, but got caught up in some of the final reductions in the church and college's work force as it all wound down prior to the sale of the campusses?

The problem is that opting out of the Social Security system was bad policy, and this bad policy is now affecting some of the people you might agree with, and some of the people you might vehemently disagree with.

What should be done? Some of the splinters have remedied this for the ministers who joined up with them, by providing continuing employment. But what of those whose consciences simply would not allow them to pursue such a course? What about the ministers who, in their 50's, suddenly found themselves beginning new careers and are only now accruing SS and Medicare benefits?

The WCG has continued to exist, uninterrupted from the time of these egregious policies, right up through the present. They may have changed their core beliefs, but the entity which originally caused the present hardships still exists, and IMO, should accept the responsibility of taking care of the people who were hurt by the original policies. Looking at this topic in a rational manner, it might even benefit the current WCG. How so? Well, if many of the aging ministers were taken care of financially, they wouldn't be selling out and continuing to teach Armstrongism just so that they could perpetuate their lifestyle! So there would be fewer leaders in the splinters, and fewer ministers would translate into accelerating the demise of a horrible false religious system.

I think we need to be making some noise about this before some of the people we knew and numbered as our friends are relegated to eating dogfood. Little Joe needs to exercise some leadership and to do the right thing for people who gave their all and are now about to pay the price for their dedication in ways they never imagined. Retirement benefits are not a paddle to be used in manipulating peoples' behavior, they are a form of basic human decency accorded to those who are too aged to be able to support themselves.

BB

Response from a former employee:

WCG has always had a pick and choose mentality as to who got retirement care. Many who were in HWA's favor got retirement, homes and cars. But if you disagreed with him you got nothing. WCG carried on that tradition. WCG had a way of getting around full retirement for all employees. They called it 'discretionary assistance'. They made the decision to base your 'care' upon whether you were a full tithe payer and supported the church.

When the blow up happened those that went with the splinters automatically lost any 'discretionary assistance'. It did not matter who they were or what their health conditions were. The money was cut off with nothing more than a form letter.

WCG made numerous promises about retirement care when they started the process of selling the properties. They made big promises when they sold Big Sandy. They reneged on all of them. They made promises when they sold the jets. Again, they reneged. Then as the sale of the Pasadena property dragged on they started cutting the payments to those loyal employees that stood by them through all the changes. Many of them had serious health issues. It did not matter. The money was cut.

Only those employees around at the end of the sale process got retirement. If you worked for the church 30 or more years you got 60% of your income. Each year less you were there, you lost 5%. These employees can never have that retirement taken away from them, that money is locked into a special retirement fund run by an outside administrator. But sadly, WCG again failed to keep more of their promises. There were many who were told they would be brought back into the program or have their funds increased. Again, it never happened.

In the early 80's WCG gave employees the opportunity to opt back into Social Security. Many jumped at the chance, Most ministers and some employees did not. Now they are left high and dry by WCG. They also began offering the opportunity to join in 403b deductions for retirement in the late 80's. But to show how sneaky WCG really was concerning retirement, there were many teachers who had been for decades payed into a retirement fund for teachers of schools and colleges. 95% of the employees and many of the ministers were never told about this opportunity. Only a select few paid into it.