Tuesday, March 31, 2015

Roderick C. Meredith Misleadingly Telling TV Viewers that LCG is Unique

Roderick C. Meredith presents himself as worthy of being followed. It is often stated that Meredith says he has not committed any major sin since he was baptized.

But on his Tomorrow's World telecast, which is mainly targeted towards those who know nothing about Armstrongism, HWA, WCG, the other COGs, Roderick C. Meredith will state that LCG is in possession of "precious insights and information available nowhere else".

How is that not a lie?

It is complete nonsense. There are literally hundreds of COG groups that all believe essentially what LCG teaches. There are indeed minor details that differ among the various COG groups but regardless they are closely related and share most of what LCG teaches.

Most COG groups (incorrectly) say that HWA was right and continue to teach most of what HWA said. The COG groups often make many prophetic speculations of the same kind as LCG.

How can Roderick C. Meredith falsely insinuate that his LCG teaches unique information that no one else has? What is the meaning of such duplicitous behavior?

This happens because Tomorrow's World telecast is made for outsiders, those who have had no involvements with Armstrongism, HWA, WCG or any of the COG offshoot groups. The goal of the Tomorrow's World telecast is to get more people to join LCG. And if it is thought that inaccurately saying that LCG has information unique to itself can do this (even though LCG has no such monopoly on the teachings of HWA) then such misleading words are spoken.

I would have thought that leaders of "God's Church" should be men unafraid of speaking the truth and honest. And yet here we see LCG's leader, Roderick C. Meredith, falsely insinuating that LCG is unique when in fact it is no such thing. There are hundreds of COG groups out there. But Roderick C. Meredith knows most people do not know about the COG groups and he is speaking to those people who are unaware of whence LCG stems from.

What follows below is a reposting of a post about Roderick C. Meredith's misleading words originally posted in 2009.

I have added in highlighting Meredith's misleading words and noting the air time of the Tomorrow's World telecast in question.

***

Recently LCG sent their co-workers a DVD featuring four Tomorrow's World broadcasts, one by each of the presenters. I got one too. Instead of talking about how you can be saved by Jesus they chose to send out programs about fear-inducing (false) prophecy.

I seriously considered destroying the DVD. But I decided to watch it. I wondered how I would view these broadcasts now that I had renounced Armstrongism. I watched Roderick C. Meredith's broadcast.

After watching Meredith's broadcast I think I shall keep it. I am actually glad they gave it to me. Why?

Well, at the end of his broadcast, The Power of Prophecy [March 12, 2009], beginning at 26:53, Meredith said, "You will gain precious insights and information available nowhere else."

This statement may well have been true when he first got caught up in Armstrongism, but he very well knows that there are many other Armstrongite churches that preach exactly the same thing as Tomorrow's World teaches. Some little details differ from sect to sect, but what unites them is far greater than what divides them.

When I discovered YouTube I soon ran into UCGia's TV program, Beyond Today: The Next Superpower. Even though I had been aware of UCG for years, thanks to LCG apologist Bob Theil's website, I was still amazed that this show taught the same thing as Tomorrow's World. That the Beast is a revival of the Roman Empire, etc, etc.

There are also many other places out there where one can learn about HWA's doctrines. There are literally hundreds of Churches of God out there, as he knows very well, many of them continuing to teach much of HWA's writings.

So that assertion, and I can personally testify that he was using precisely that kind of language when I first started watching his program way back in 2000, is simply not true.

How dare you say something that is simply untrue.

This reminds me that back in June 2008 Stan reported that Roderick Meredith on his faculty page at Living University portray Meredith as having graduated from Ambassador University. It still says that.

This also reminds of what one former LCG member wrote in this letter, "When I was in LCG in 2001, Meredith was like a chameleon and could change at will. He was very slick and I witnessed him lie whenever it served his purposes."

Also in AR 29 October 1984, under the heading 'Meredith's Counseling' the following was written concerning what Robert Hoops, who at the time was a minister with Garner Ted Armstrong's CGI, had to say about Roderick Meredith:
During a deposition and later with us privately, Hoops described how, when Meredith once counseled his wife, Meredith made such insensitive and unwarranted accusations against him that his wife cried for a week. When he found out later what had been said about him, he became so depressed he was almost suicidal. Said Hoops, "When you have really committed your life to the church and believe the ministry represents God, a harsh assessment of you by a superior can literally create severe emotional trauma." On the stand, Hoops was asked by Stuart for his opinion of Meredith. But Judge Olson disallowed the question. Later, however, Hoops was quite candid with us about his assessment of Meredith's character.

"Meredith is a liar," said Hoops. "But that isn't surprising when you consider how big a liar he works for." Sadly, Hoops' opinion of Meredith is shared by many ministers who served under him in years past.
Alas! Because of the misleading statement he made in his TV program I regretfully am forced to conclude that such an assessment seems most reasonable to believe.

After seeing him make such an obviously untrue statement on TV, what other conclusion can there be?

To paraphrase what Stan said on that Ambassador Reports blog about him then, "Tell the truth!!"

Monday, March 30, 2015

Roderick C. Meredith's 1969 Letter Promoting HWA's Anti-Medicine Superstition

HWA taught an anti-medicine superstition in which he banned medical treatment for his followers saying that relying on anyone else aside from (HWA's) God to heal oneself of sickness and illnesses was sinful and would result in going to the Lake of Fire after one's death. HWA taught this in his 1952 booklet, Does God Heal Today?  Because of this teaching many of his followers in the Radio/Worldwide Church of God have died or otherwise compromised their health.

Around 1969 that murderous booklet was taken out of circulation but the anti-medicine superstition it taught was not renounced. In 1969, despite the many terrible things that had occurred because of this doctrine of death, Roderick C. Meredith wrote this letter sent to all WCG ministers below saying "we should continue to preach this doctrine [HWA's anti-medicine superstition as taught in the 1952 booklet] to the converted members of God's Church with earnestness and fervency!"

Unlike "Divorce and Remarriage" this murderous doctrine was never renounced by WCG during HWA's lifetime. PCG to this day denounces the renunciation of this doctrine of death as the first sign of the Tkach changes, willfully ignoring the most frightful damage this teaching did. 

Thankfully Roderick C. Meredith no longer seems to teach this doctrine of death in LCG. Although it is good he no longer teaches this most frightful doctrine the damage HWA's doctrine of death has done is still with us and the victims are forced to endure what has happened to them for the rest of their lives.

This is from William Hinson, Broadway to Armageddon (1978), pp. 142-143. It is PDF p. 73 in the link.

According to Ambassador Report this letter was written in 1969 to the entire WCG ministry.

Just one year after writing this letter Roderick C. Meredith hypocritically got surgery to heal a detached retina while so many WCG members had suffered and even died in order to follow HWA's anti-medicine superstition.

Here is the letter in question.

***

On another matter, it recently came to my attention that in at least one Church area, an official "Church nurse" had been appointed. This should never be done! While it is fine for deaconesses and other Church ladies to help out from time to time when individuals in a local church are sick, we do not want to appoint an official Church nurse or even intimate that the Church provides any kind of medical assistance or advice. In matters of healing and medicine, our only responsibility is to inform our members what the Bible says with regard to faith and healing. It is strictly up to them, before God, what they do about their physical infirmities or sicknesses, and it is strictly up to them to seek medical counsel or advice if they so choose. Mr. Herbert Armstrong has recently made it clear that this is an area in which we must be very careful in order to avoid problems that could affect the entire Work.

Although we continue to receive reports of many healings and miracles which God is performing, I would like to remind you in closing to pray fervently for a number of our brethren who appear to be dying of cancer and other maladies. Mrs. Curtis Cowan, Sr., appeared to be healed of one ailment, yet now we find that she has cancer of the colon and liver. She is in very bad shape and suffering considerable pain from time to time.

Also, Mrs. Dennis Luker's parents, Mr. and Mrs. Livengood, are both suffering from cancer. Unless God intervenes, she could lose both her parents a few weeks or a few months apart.   "din [sic] addition, Mrs. Jack Francis--the wife of our fire marshall here at the College--is in extremely critical condition with cancer through much of her body. She has suffered considerable pain and those in attendance thought more than once that she was dying over a period of a few weeks now.

Many, many others have serious cases of cancer or are afflicted with other serious ailments. And, as I mentioned recently, this seems to be a growing trend in the Church. Although the booklet on healing in its present form has been cancelled, we should continue to preach this doctrine to the converted members of God's Church with earnestness and fervency! Remember to tell them what God says--not giving personal advice as to what they "have to do" in any particular case.

But we must remember that Jesus' commission was to 1) Preach the gospel; 2) Heal the sick, and 3) Cast out demons. See Matthew 4:23-24, Matthew 10:7-8 and Mark 3:14-15, etc. More of us need to study and meditate on these examples--and to pray fervently that God will restore the fullness of the gifts of healing to His Church.

Saturday, March 28, 2015

Roderick C. Meredith: A Biographical Sketch--Part 1 (Repost)

Back in 2009 I wrote a biographical sketch of Roderick C. Meredith. Considering the recent wave of discontent currently within LCG, apparently partly caused by widespread dismay at the power of Jim Meredith here is what I wrote about him.

This is just Part 1. Here are the rest of them: Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6

We now begin:

***

First of all I would like to say thanks again to all my readers. Your comments are greatly appreciated and inspires me to keep going with this blog. Thank you again.

Now I have been working on a little biographical sketch of my former cultmeister, Roderick C. Meredith which I will now begin posting. Now I have no special insider information. The vast majority of this information is easily accessible on the Internet and is often linked in my little biographical sketch. And now let us begin.

Roderick C. Meredith-A Biographical Sketch:
Part 1 Rise to the Ministry

1930: born in Joplin, Missouri to, according to Wikipedia's article on Roderick C. Meredith, H. Carl Meredith and Mildred Kohane Meredith (born 1902). He would later have two sisters, Kathryn who is the wife of Richard Ames and Patty who never accepted Armstrongism. The Merediths are Methodist.

In his teenage years he came to learn of Herbert W. Armstrong through his uncle C. Paul Meredith. He gives this account of how he became involved in Armstrongism in his 1962 booklet The Inside Story of the World Tomorrow (my comments are in italics):
'A little over fifteen years ago, I was highly impressed by Mr. Armstrong's understanding of the Bible and of prophecy in particular, but I wasn't by any means sure that this was the very work of God. But I desperately wanted to know. I first became interested in the Work and broadcast through the encouragement of my uncle Dr. C. Paul Meredith--now Director of The Ambassador Colege Correspondence Course. He had already been listening to the broadcast for many years--since about 1943. He had always been a student, and he took careful notes on Mr. Armstrong's prophetic sermons. As time went on, he compared these notes to the events that were taking place--and to what other preachers had said--and soon came to realize that Mr. Armstrong was the only one who actually knew what was going to happen BEFORE it happened! [What about HWA's prediction that Christ will return in 1936? What about HWA's identification of Mussolini as the 'Beast'? What about his later identification of Hitler as 'the Beast'?] When I was a junior in high school, my uncle and I began listening to the program together somewhat regularly. I could see that it made sense [Does failed prophecies make sense? Ironically on p. 51 of this very booklet he has the cover of the June-July 1934 Plain Truth which on p.3 contain's HWA's famous chart showing that 1936 will be the 'end of days'.], and that I actually learned more about the Bible through each broadcast than I would have in six months in the large Protestant church our family attended. [That's because the only way HWA could gain people's allegiance is to convince them that his doctrines are the truth. In Meredith's former church it would appear that there was not such a great emphasis on doctrine as many churches do not need to go into the minute details of doctrine to maintain membership. HWA needed to convince people of his doctrines to gain followers. Explaining doctrine does not mean it is the 'true' church.] But at the same time, I was leading an active, busy life as a high school student and athlete. I was on the football and track teams, and boxed in the Golden Gloves tournaments. Since running the mile was my specialty, I hoped to win a track scholarship to the state university by that means. (The Inside Story of the World Tomorrow Broadcast, 1962, pp. 12-13.)
1949: Goes to Junior College, Joplin.
'I spent a summer "stewing" over what to do. Then I studied this world's "philosophy" at a college for a year--becoming more thoroughly convinced than ever that I needed to understand the PURPOSE of life. So I decided that I would go to Pasadena and meet this Mr. Armstrong face to face. I would get to really know him, if possible. And I would "check up" on him! He was not going to pull the wool over MY eyes. I came to Pasadena, and enrolled in Ambassador College in September, 1949.' (The Inside Story of the World Tomorrow Broadcast, 1962, p. 13.)
I am sorry to say this but HWA did pull the wool over his eyes. How can he say that HWA made sense despite the many false prophesies he made even by this time. In light of what God says in Deuteronomy 18:22 (When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass [remember 1975?], that is the thing which the LORD hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him) it is impossible to give any credence to HWA and remain true to the Bible.

1951: Junior. Transferred from Junior College, Joplin. President of Student Council (2ed semester, 1951) (1951 Envoy, p. 13). While at Ambassador College he is a roommate with Herman Hoeh.

1952: President of Student Body and Senior Class 51-2. Sports editor. The Good News. Interested in lawn and table tennis. (1952 Envoy, p. 11). Gradually accepts ’call’ to ministry (PT June 1960, p.4. ).

December, Herman Hoeh, Raymond Cole, Richard David Armstrong, C. Paul Meredith and Roderick C. Meredith are ordained as Evangelists in that order. (Worldwide News, January 2, 1978, ' Evangelists Honored on 25th Anniversary', p. 1).

LCG often emphasizes that Meredith was one of the first ordained Evangelists in order to assert his legitimacy as successor to HWA. See their 'about us' page on the LCG website ('Roderick C. Meredith...was one of the original evangelists ordained by the late Herbert W. Armstrong in December 1952'). How can seniority of ordination be a valid principle of succession? If it was then we should have followed Herman Hoeh, who accepted the Tkachite changes, or Raymond Cole who left over the doctrinal changes of 1974. Seniority of ordination does not prove that one has the right to exercise leadership over believers. The fact that Meredith relies on such a weak argument to prove his legitimacy proves how desperate he is in maintaining his authority.

To be continued...

Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6

Friday, March 27, 2015

Did Gerald Flurry Read Michael Hastings' Book? No. He Just Used a Right Wing News Source He Liked


 
Back when I read Gerald Flurry's extremely silly booklet, America Under Attack, (and learned that Gerald Flurry says President Obama is an Antichrist like figure) I was surprised to see that it seemed that Gerald Flurry or one of his underlings had been reading a book by the late Michael Hastings and watched an interview of him on MSNBC.

Normally PCG's writers have a strong tendency to read for the most part right wing news sources. They do sometimes quote left wing news sources but it is very rare.

Less surprising was how Gerald Flurry portrayed Michael Hastings in a very bad light in order to proclaim President Obama to be some sort of Antichrist like figure possessed by Satan and his demons. 
Reporter Michael Hastings published a book called Panic 2012: The Sublime and Terrifying Inside Story of Obama’s Final Campaign. In it, he described the intriguing personal effect that the president would have on the journalists covering him on the campaign trail.

In an interview about his book, Hastings told MSNBC’s Martin Bashir, “But that’s the presence of Obama, even on the press corps—even on the people who follow him every day. When they’re near him, they lose their minds sometimes. They start behaving in ways that are juvenile, and amateurish, and they swoon (emphasis mine throughout).

Can you explain that? What a terrible indictment against our media! What is going on? Reporters swooning and acting like nervous teenagers around a politician—is that normal? I don’t remember ever reading anything like this in American politics!

The mainstream media regularly just go along with what the president says, even at times when it can be easily proven false. What is causing such actions?

Even Hastings himself admitted to getting caught up in this behavior around the president. “I do,” he laughed. “I totally—oh man!”

This reporter thinks this is funny. Is it really funny? No, it is an unparalleled, colossal disaster!

Hastings described a recent opportunity he had to ask questions of the president. “Did I ask the hardball questions?” he admitted with a smile. “No, I did not”—opting instead to ask the “soft” questions.

Why would that happen? Can Satan have such an influence? Yes he can! And that is only the beginning! (Gerald Flurry, America Under Attack, Chapter 2, pp. 12-13.)
(This ignores the fact that there are a lot of people opposing President Obama but in this silly booklet President Obama is nonsensically demonized as being all powerful and under Satanic influences.)

What happened? How did Gerald Flurry gain access to this source considering how rarely PCG ever pays attention to what left wingers are doing except to demonize them?

Turns out it is very likely Gerald Flurry simply got this information from a right wing news source, namely The Blaze (Jason Howerton "Reporter: Obama’s Press Corps Can’t Help But ‘Lose Their Minds’ and ‘Swoon’ When They’re in His ‘Presence’", January 24, 2013), as may be seen in this video from PCG.

This article is not mentioned in the booklet, America Under Attack.

PCG's Art Department Glorifying PCG

PCG has released an article about their Art Department.
Officially, the art department began in the summer of 2012. According to editorial manager Joel Hilliker, the department was needed because Pastor General Gerald Flurry wanted biblical figures and depictions brought to life. Initially, Mr. Hilliker worked with Gary Dorning, a professional artist who lived in the Pacific Northwest, sending sketches back and forth of illustrations like the Daniel 2 image, the Revelation 13 image, and the cover of the April 2013 Trumpet magazine. Soon after, Mr. Flurry approved the formation of the art department, and Mr. Dorning moved to headquarters. You have seen his handiwork on many recent Trumpet covers and illustrations.
(For whatever reason there is no mention of Steve Wilkins in this article.)

Alas, these pieces of art are used to glorify and promote a group that is well known to have many severe problems.

PCG promotes HWA's anti-medicine superstition which has caused so many people to die before their time. It even appears to have played a role in the death of Garth MacDonald in 2006. (The late Garth MacDonald's brother, Brad MacDonald, is one of the main leaders of PCG.)

PCG forbids PCG members from meeting with members of other COG groups who are demonized as "Laodiceans" who must be shunned as part of PCG's infamous No Contact policy.

PCG promotes all kinds of inaccurate ideas such as British Israelism. As Silenced.co has shown British Israelism is built on a foundation of sand. In fact DNA evidence refutes British Israelism.

PCG promotes paranoid and hateful ideas, unusually inaccurate, to vilify people they do not like. PCG even says that President Obama is some sort of Antichrist like figure ("another Antiochus").

These pictures do nothing to solve these problems but rather keep PCG members believing that PCG is the one true church which they must stay in despite the many problems within it.

PCG's Amy Flurry The Singer

Stephen Flurry's wife is Amy Flurry. She has also sung songs for PCG as well. Here are some songs she has sung that can be listened from PCG's website.

Hannah (2000)

The Fortress (2002)

Animal Kingdom (2003)

Plowshares

Sadly no matter what pretty songs PCG makes it does nothing to alleviate the severe problems within PCG. PCG has a terrible reputation among those who know about it and these songs do nothing to correct those problems.

Thursday, March 26, 2015

PCG's Demonization of Muslims Part 2: Conceiving Hate (2001-3)


December 2001 issue.
(Note the reference to Japan.)

[Update: July 6, 2016: After writing this post I became aware of another article scare mongering against Iran in the period 1998-2001 before 9/11. The post has been amended accordingly.]

So in a previous post looking through PCG's articles from 1998-2001 before 9/11 it was seen that PCG paid surprisingly little attention to the Middle East.

They tended to focus on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict but even with the second intifada erupting it was only mentioned once every few issues, not all the time.

Even more surprisingly PCG was deafeningly silent about Iran. Only one article fear mongered about Iran being the King of the South. [See update.]

If anything they tended to fear monger about Germany and China more than the Arabs and Iranians that PCG's writers have so often railed against.

But now we reach the unfathomably catastrophic crime of 9/11. Did the leaders of PCG change their tune following that most wicked act of mass murder?

Here is a list of articles relevant to this discussion published in The Philadelphia Trumpet between the November 2001 issue and the January 2003 issue.

Looking at it is it quite clear how PCG's writers have latched onto the Middle East in a way they had done before. Events on the Middle East are discussed in just about every issue. Before 9/11 PCG tended to only mention Middle Eastern politics in an issue that would focus on it. Now fear mongering about the Middle East is present in just about every issue.

Also PCG is now much more focused on Iran. Iran was only mentioned in one article between 1998 and 2001 before 9/11. [See update.] Now in this shorter period (November 2001 -- January 2003) there are six articles that fear monger about Iran.

So it is clear that PCG's leaders became decidedly more fixated upon Middle East events after 9/11. And it was only after 9/11 that PCG's leaders began to constantly harp on about Iran within the pages of their recruitment magazine as part of their demonization of Iran.

***

Here are the articles:

2001

November

The Battle Lines Broaden by Ron Fraser.

(Here Ron Fraser venomously insinuates that Muslims are scary and prone to violence and hatred.
Americans, in their extreme penchant for even-handedness, have been selling themselves the lie that most Muslims are peaceful folks. If this be the case, why is it that America’s own media continue to throw up perpetual video images of hundreds, even thousands, in Iraq and Pakistan, demonstrating against the U.S. and baying for the blood of American men, women and children?
Fraser then focus his sights particularly on Wahhabism, a strict form of Sunni Islam that is enforced within Saudi Arabia.
It may well be that the majority of Muslims are peace-loving people. But the point is that the most aggressive force within Islam on the political and religious fronts is the Wahhabi movement that has spawned TERRORISM.
He then suddenly brings up Iran, which is Shiite, which is not Wahhabi at all. Wahhabism is a strand of the other kind of Islam, Sunni Islam.
Biding its time as events shape up in the Middle East is the most dominant Muslim nation of all: Iran. The Iranians have a long-term goal in mind which was concisely articulated at the close of the Gulf War: ...
But Fraser seems very confused about Wahhabism. He somehow thinks it dates to the seventh century when in fact it only started in the eighteenth century.
Granted, the terrorists themselves represent the extreme of violent Islamic hatred. Writing for [another publication], [a non-PCG writer] indicates that the militant Islamic sect from which the terrorists hailed is the Wahhabi, dating from the very establishment of Islam in the seventh century. 
Somehow Fraser never bothered to note that this is wildly inaccurate.)

The Head of the Snake by Joel Hilliker.

(Here Hilliker insists the real threat to America within the Middle East is Iran.)

A New Push for Palestine

IRA/Al Qaeda Link?

Volatile Allies

December

The Power of Religion by Ron Fraser

(Here Fraser venomously portrays Al Qaeda as a creation of the left.
What is intriguing is that many of al-Qaeda’s operatives gained their education on the liberal-socialist campuses of the universities of the West. With middle-class backgrounds, these university-educated converts to militant Islam are the new wave of youthful, bored offspring of a generation which has matured within or under the structure of soft, corrupt elites. Ripe for the plucking, just as the turned-off Western youth of the 1960s and ’70s were to their Marxist-Leninist revolutionary mentors, these young people have been easy meat for brainwashing by fundamentalist mullahs intent on jihad against the West. Nurtured by the widespread Islamic resentment of the power and prosperity of the West, they rationalize the miserable political, social and economic record of Islamic countries by swallowing the neo-Marxist theories that explain Third World poverty as being the result of exploitation by the West.
Fraser insists this is a war of religion thus making all Muslims everywhere worthy of blame in Fraser's eyes.
Many world leaders have gone out of their way to try and sway global opinion to their claim that the terrorist war declared on the U.S. and the West is not a religious war. But if this be the case, why are they trying so hard to convince us? Perhaps there is more to this than meets the electronic eye of TV. It is time we faced the facts... 
What Salman Rushdie says is right: This is a religious war! It has been declared, loud and strong, by one of its principle antagonists as such. In a videotaped message aired over Arabian television stations, Osama bin Laden said, “This war is primarily a religious war.” Appealing to Muslims worldwide, he said, “Rise in support of your religion. Islam is calling you” (Toronto Star, Nov. 4). This is the opposite message to the one President Bush is seeking to put across to those Muslim states he hopes to retain in the coalition against terrorism.
Then why did Al Qaeda kill so many Muslims?

Maybe Ron Fraser should have bothered to note that over thirty of the victims of 9/11 were Muslims. Many of them Bangladeshis who worked in a restaurant. Maybe Ron Fraser should have asked himself why was Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden willing to murder them as well if there really is "a religious war"?

And Ron Fraser agrees with Osama bin Laden. He trusts Osama bin Laden.
But does this justify the murderous terror tactics of extremist Muslims against the U.S.? Does this justify jihad? It seems so to the fundamentalist Muslims. For theirs is an intolerant religion that labels all unbelievers as infidels and has a history of converting people by force. Islam’s history is a history of war! It is not a pretty picture. Its history is anything but a history of peace!
An who else loves to vilify every other religion as false, even shunning members of related groups that happen to believe many of the same things? Why, PCG of course.)

Negotiating Peace by Jason Hensley

(Although this article talks about the Middle East it is devoted towards fear mongering about Germany. So this article is not really about any Muslims.)

2002

January

The Beating Heart of Prophecy by Joel Hilliker.

(This issue surveys world events in several regions of the world. This article is the one devoted to the Middle East, specifically talking about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Iran.
What is happening with Iran today? And with radical Islam?
 No mention of Iraq in this article strangely enough.)

February

Center of World Terror by Gerald Flurry.

(This article condemns Yasser Arafat and Iran.)

March

Up for Grabs by Ron Fraser.

(This article fear mongers about Central Asia, states newly independent of what used to be the Soviet Union. It is worth noting that none of them have turned into Islamist states as was insinuated here.)

May

What is Happening in the Middle East? by Ron Fraser

(Here Fraser talks about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict then in the throes of the second intifada.)

June

The Two Faces of Iran by Joel Hilliker

(Here Hilliker insists that Iran is still to be feared despite hope that then President Khatami would calm tensions down.)

August

Revolution in the Air

(About Iran. Here it is insinuated that revolution may soon occur in Iran.
neighboring Iran seethes with internal discontent.  ... The symbolism will not be lost on the large reform-minded population that forms the majority vote in Iran. Over half of this group is under the age of 25. Though endorsing their timid reform-minded president, Mohammed Khatami, their patience could really be stretched as they wait for this non-aggressive leader to instigate the reforms for which they voted him into office.
Yet another false prophecy.)

September

9/11: One Year Later by Gerald Flurry

Novemeber

What President Bush Doesn't Know by Joel Hilliker

(Here Hilliker moans that Iran should have been the real target. This article is mentioned in a previous post.)

December

The Solution to Israel's Problems by Gerald Flurry

(About the Israeli-Palestinian conflict again.)

2003

January

2002: The Real Stories by Ron Fraser

Hebron's History--Key to Peace by Gerald Flurry

(This is largely a reprint of an article by Gerald Flurry in the June 2001 issue of The Philadelphia Trumpet. Here the murder of two Israeli juveniles are exploited to promote PCG's false prophecies.)

(Israel:) Closer with Germany

(Here it is once again fearfully asserted that the State of Israel will be deserted by the United States and forced to ally with the European Union only to be cruelly betrayed.
We continue to point out that Israel will find the European Union, in particular Germany in concert with the Vatican, more than willing to fill the vacuum left by the U.S. Watch for this relationship to continue to grow as the EU, particularly Germany, sends more support to Israel, while at the same time playing a balancing act with the Palestinians as its chief benefactor.
PCG said this in 1996 in Chapter 3 of the original version of Gerald Flurry's booklet, Hosea and God's Adulterous Wife, in Gerald Flurry's 2001 booklet, Jerusalem in Prophecy, and they continue to say this same story to this day.)

***

And so the January 2003 issue was then followed by the February 2003 issue. But this post ends here.

To be continued...

Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Roderick C. Meredith's Shameful Role in "Divorce and Remarriage" Policy

(Update: March 27: This post has been mentioned and discussed by Banned by HWA. My thanks to No2HWA in helping to make these facts known.)

With the recent controversy currently surrounding LCG because of widespread concern about Jim Meredith's prominent role within LCG let us revisit the following dark and sordid aspect of Roderick C. Meredith's history within Armstrongism.

Roderick C. Meredith played an instrumental and vital role in imposing HWA's draconian "divorce and remarriage" teaching that destroyed so many families based on arbitrary requirements that HWA imposed. This draconian doctrine was inflicted on many Radio Church of God/Worldwide Church of God members until it was abolished in 1974. Although it was no longer enforced after 1974 the victims to this day are forced to live with the negative consequences of this ghastly and draconian policy which Roderick C. Meredith did so much to enforce.

Evidence of Roderick C. Meredith's role in this ghastly policy that did so much harm to so many of HWA's followers may be seen in the following letter, written in 1969, and later reproduced in William Hinson' book, Broadway to Armageddon (1977).

This is from William Hinson, Broadway to Armageddon, Chapter 9, pp. 150-6. (Pages 76-80 in the link.)

(In Hinson's book this letter was printed with commentary from Hinson interspersed within the letter. I have taken the liberty of removing these comments and present what Meredith wrote in this letter that did so much harm.)

Here it is:

******



WORLDWIDE CHURCH OF GOD
World Headquarters
Pasadena, California
Herbert W. Armstrong
President and Pastor
Office of
Roderick C. Meredith Second Vice-President

July 18, 1969

Special instructions: SAVE!

Dear Fellow Ministers:

This is a special letter of instruction regarding the handling of divorce and marriage cases. I hope all of you will read it very carefully and follow these instructions in handling these cases/

Appeal to them to be open-minded and candid about any pertinent information or intimate details of their past marriages. Let them know that you have gone into intimate details of dozens of cases and that you are not going to to be shocked at all. They should not hold back anything about any pertinent romantic or sex relationships before marriage. Tell them--if these factors apply--that you are God's minister and are married, have children and know about sex. Also, that you are bound as God's minister not to divulge any of it to anyone, and that, in fact, you forget most details anyway as you go through more and more cases.

There are ten basic questions you should ask and write up for review by your District Superintendent in regard to the previous marriages. Go through each question in detail, and be sure your write-up is thorough. Get specific answers, not general ones. Use the first names of the people involved throughout the write-up to avoid confusion, and be sure to go through each case chronologically. Keep in mind that the ministry is not a detective agency. It is the responsibility of the people to get the facts, not the ministry. We can only base our decision on the facts that they present. The basic questions to ask are as follows:

1. Has either party been married before? How many times? If so, go through each marriage in chronological order covering the following points to finally determine their present status. Remember to ask about any "common-law" situations or "arrangements" while the man was overseas in the service, etc.

2. When did the original couple become acquainted? (Approximate date and their ages.) Ask the family background, religion, etc., of their parents.

3. How long and what type of courtship did they have? Did they have formal dates? Was petting involved? Fornication?

4. Did they discuss home, family, children?

5. What were the ages when both parties married? Were their ages legal?

6. Did the parents grant permission for the marriage? If not, did they try to annul it? Did they follow through on annulment or acquiesce?

7. What kind of marriage was it? (Justice of the Peace or church?) What were the circumstances of the wedding--elopement, shotgun wedding, church, etc.

8. What were the attitudes of each party involved before and at the marriage? Did they really intend to be husband and wife? If not, why did they marry? Ask and pull it out of them. This is a key factor. You may need to keep going back asking about their intentions in marriage over and over throughout the entire discussion. Ask about it in different ways, but get this point thoroughly established if possible!

9. What fruits of point #4 above were evident? Did they buy furniture and dishes, rent an apartment, set up housekeeping, or live with their parents, etc.? Did he properly support her or at least try to be a husband in this regard? Did they make a home and perform the duties of a husband and wife? Did he provide for the home? Did she cook, sew and keep house? Did they have normal sex relations?

10. Was there previous fornication with anyone else or fraud of any kind involved?

We must judge the spirit of fraud as well--lesbian or homosexual, absolute alcoholic, dope addict, demonism, etc. These are matters affecting the character and being of the individual. The question is "Did God bind the marriage, or is either party the victim of a fraud?" Once the fraud is discovered, they must separate or else God will then bind the marriage if they continue to live together with the knowledge of the fraud. If the couple has lived together for a number of years and fraud is discovered later, and if the man then puts her away for that reason, the marriage is not binding. If he forgives her or "tolerates" the fraud and continues to live with her, God then binds the marriage.

Tell the people that what they told us is the basis of our decision. If they have not told us the truth, then they are sternly accountable to God Himself as were Ananias and Sapphira!

When all the facts bearing upon the case have been written up, do NOT inform the individuals of your decision based upon those facts unless the former marriage was clearly binding and you are SURE the case is cut and dried. In this instance, they may make their decision to separate sexually (though you should not "tell" or command them to do anything!) But do not advise one or the other to move out until the decision has been confirmed by your District Superintendent. In cases where the former marriage does not appear binding, or where there is some doubt in you[r] mind as to whether or not it was binding, do not give them the decision until it has the final approval of your District Superintendent. Give them the benefit of the doubt until the decision is final.

So that everyone will now have a complete, thorough and uniform approach to divorce and remarriage cases, I will give you vital guidelines that all of you should now be following. We here on the Headquarters' "team" have spent dozens of hours working out and reviewing these guidelines. So SAVE this special letter and use it regularly in handling D& R cases!

First of all, before you tell people they are bound to a previous mate according to God's Word, you had better be sure that they are. You can be sure, of course, only after the whole case has been written up in detail and submitted, first of all, to your District Superintendent for approval of the decision. The minister in charge should be handling these cases and making the decisions, not Local Elders.

Do NOT tell the people before the decision is made that you think their present marriage is "probably" valid or "probably" not valid in God's sight! Just tell them that you cannot advise them on their situation until you have the full details about the previous marriages and also check with your District Superintendent. Giving people false hopes can make an eventual separation even more difficult than it would be normally, or make the individuals involved bitter against God's Church and you personally if the case doesn't come out the way you indicated that it would.

Don't go into the case unless you have the time to go into it thoroughly. Begin by asking them whether they have counseled with anyone else--a Catholic priest, etc., or one of our ministers--in regard to the validity of their marriage. Then ask if they have read our booklet on Divorce and Remarriage. If they havn't, you may advise them to write for it and postpone further discussion until they have read and studied the booklet. If they have read the booklet, ask them if they agree with the Bible teaching on divorce and remarriage. Find out if they are willing to go along with the decision reached and separate, if necessary, in order to obey God. If they won't, then there is no need to pursue the case further.

Explain that we don't tell people to separate, but if they come to us wanting to become a member of God's Church, we merely tell them what God requires of them before He will put them in His Church. It is just a matter of whether they are willing to obey God, and if they are, God will put them in His Church.

If one of the mates is not interested in the Church, just explain to him or her that just as any club has its own membership rules, God has set down certain requirements that must be met before a person can become a member of the Church of God. It is our responsibility as His ministers to explain these requirements, but what the individual does about it is his own private and personal business.

Try every means to induce the unconverted mate to talk freely and give the necessary information about any previous marriages. If the converted or interested wife does see fit to separate or threatens to separate sexually until a decision is reached, this is often a powerful means to induce the man to co-operate and be willing to sit down and discuss the case.

If an antagonistic mate simply will not divulge information on previous marriages, try to find out the basic details from the converted mate--or other relatives or friends--and you may be able to be sure from that. We cannot assume that the present marriage is not bound without adequate facts. It is up to them. If the unconverted mate is not willing to discuss it, what the other does is up to the individual. We will tell neither what to do--though if the weight of the evidence indicates, the converted mate probably should separate until the decision is made.

If they are willing to abide by the decision reached and if they want a decision made based on God's Word, let them know that this is a very serious issue and may be a turning point in their lives which could affect their eternal salvation. Warn them that they may be tempted to twist the facts, gloss over certain facts and even lie about certain aspects of their previous marriages. Remind them of what happened to Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5 in explaining God's attitude toward those who lie to His ministers. Ask them if they have already made up their minds about whether their past marriages were binding. If they have, there is no point in pursuing the matter further.

Do NOT send the information you have written up directly to Headquarters! Send the information--along with the decision you reached if you were able to reach one--to your District Superintendent, and be sure to keep a copy for your local files. He will then either approve or disagree with the decision. Or on those which you were not able to decide, he will, if possible, make the decision and forward the case write-up and the decision to Headquarters for our records. The District Superintendent need NOT keep a giant file on all case write-ups--just those for the churches he personally pastors.

We will make the decisions only on those that the District Superintendents refer to us to decide. In these cases, we will then send both the local minister and the District Superintendent a copy of our decision.

If the final decision was that they are not bound to their present mate, tell them verbally, in person, that according to CHRIST'S TEACHINGS THEY ARE NOT BOUND AND THAT NOW THEY NEED TO DECIDE WHAT TO DO IF THEY WISH TO OBEY God. But once a case like this has been fully gone into and decided, the people must NOT be allowed to attend if they insist on living in adultery!

Do not, under ANY circumstance, put the decision in writing! It could be used against us in court, as occurred in one case that all of you are familiar with.

When one of the mates is not being called, emphasize again that we are not telling them separate, but that we are only telling them what God's Word says, and be especially discreet when the mate is antagonistic. If a woman decides to separate against the wishes of her unconverted "husband," we cannot help her to make the separation in any way. After she has made the decision to obey God and has separated, we will then help her in any way we can--again, using discretion, of course.

If they both agree to the separation, we should offer help and advice in carrying out their decision. They should separate geographically--at least a state away in most instances, and in every case should be in different Church areas.

Only in very rare circumstances--perhaps when one or both are senile and when one or the other is crippled or severely disabled--might a brother-sister relationship be approved. In no case, however, should you hold out this hope until this arrangement has been approved by Headquarters! We have found that brother-sister relationships just do not work--even though they might, and I say might, be able to remain sexually separate. They are still living in a husband-wife relationship in their minds. Only in very unusual and extreme circumstances would this arrangement be approved. We have learned some hard lessons on this through the years!

We have enclosed a list of the ten questions with this letter on a separate piece of paper so that you can carry it with you on D & R counselings. This will help you include all the important information in writing up the cases. You can just write the number of each question and take notes on each answer in order to write it up in complete, thorough form later. You should then go over the completed write-up with the individuals involved to get last-minute clarifications and to verify that the information is accurate since the decision may hinge on certain vital facts, and their accuracy is very important.

Take time to do a thorough job on these, fellows, and be sure your write-ups are easily legible (preferably typed) and in order according to the ten points we are giving you. We all know how these decisions affect people's lives, so let's all prayerfully do our best as God's representatives.

Your brother in Christ,
Roderick C. Meredith


P.S. We will only send you a couple of sample copies of different types of cases because of the importance of writing these up correctly.

P.P.S. Remember! From now on send your D & A write-ups ONLY to your District Superintendent. He will confirm or reject your decision, decide those in question, and he will forward the case write-ups to us. Also, he will ask Headquarters to decide those crucial cases even he is not sure of--hopefully, very few!

So study, keep and USE this letter as a basic "manual" on handling D & R cases from now on!

Tuesday, March 24, 2015

Roderick C. Meredith Condemns Banned by HWA by Name for Publicizing Criticism of Jim Meredith

Banned by HWA is reporting that Roderick C. Meredith has condemned by name for publicizing criticism of his son Jim Meredith in an earlier post by an LCG member who dared to speak out on that topic.

If anyone in LCG thought they would not have to worry that Jim Meredith would take over LCG have now seen that Jim Meredith is well protected by Roderick Meredith and it is quite possible that Jim Meredith might be able to gain leadership of LCG after Roderick Meredith and Richard Ames pass away.

Saturday, March 21, 2015

Daniel Pipes (via Joel Hilliker) is PCG's Link to the Islamophobia Network

The Islamophobia Network
Here is how PCG's leaders describe Daniel Pipes: "Commentator", "commentator on Middle Eastern issues", " a respected voice in Middle Eastern affairs", "Middle East analyst", "a columnist who often writes pieces supporting Israel’s right to exist", "enlightened thinker", "expert on Islamic affairs", "Islamic affairs expert", "Middle East expert", "analyst". In one article it is even mentioned he heads the Middle East Forum.

In fact Daniel Pipes is one of the central figures of the Islamophobia Network which was identified by the Center for American Progress in their 2011 report Fear, Inc.

Pipes' organization, the Middle East Forum, "received more than $12 million"  between 2001 and 2011 from six of the eight charities that fund the Islamophobia Network. Those eight charities poured in $57 million between 2001 and 2011 to organizations that vilify Muslims.
The Middle East Forum is at the center of the Islamophobia network. MEF has received more than $12 million in funding from donors in the network since 2001,
The Middle East Forum contributes to money to Robert Spencer's Jihad Watch blog, Steven Emerson's organization, Investigative Project on Terrorism and Robert Gaffney's organization, Center for Security Policy. Those three persons have also been quoted by PCG as experts.

Daniel Pipes is often published by FrontPageMagazine, an organization which is also a part of the Islamophobia Network.

Daniel Pipes also is an adviser for the Clarion Project (formerly the Clarion Fund) which infamously produced Obsession, a film infamous for vilifying Muslims.

There is no indication that PCG has approached Daniel Pipes or vice versa, but it is clear that his writings are taken quite seriously by PCG's leaders.

Here are 38 quotes from Daniel Pipes that PCG's writers have made of his writings. Fourteen are from articles by Joel Hilliker. Five from Brad MacDonald (including one written with Richard Palmer). Two from Ron Fraser. Two from David Vejil (including one written with Victor Vejil). One from Mark Jenkins and Callum Wood each. One article was by Philip Nice and Robert Morley. One article was by Victor Vejil and David Vejil. Ten are anonymous.

One quote is from Gerald Flurry but it is actually taken from an article by Joel Hilliker. This is further evidence that Joel Hilliker serves as Gerald Flurry's ghost writer.

It is quite striking how Joel Hilliker's name keeps popping up on this list far more than anyone else. Fourteen times, nearly three times as many as Brad MacDonald, who only quoted Pipes in five articles.

This seems to indicate that Joel Hilliker may be the main person driving PCG's embrace of anti-Muslim attitudes. Or at least that he was the one assigned to write about this topic.

Daniel Pipes is PCG's main link to the Islamophobia Network. And Joel Hilliker seems to be PCG's main connection to him.

Here are the quotes from PCG's writings which show how often they use Daniel Pipes' writings.

***      

Commentator Daniel Pipes asserts that the current period of “backwardness, resentment, extremism and violence” within much of the Muslim world is actually atypical of Islam’s long history. “[I]ndeed,” he concludes, “it may be the worst era in that entire history” (National Post, Aug. 2, 2002). ...

Even on the individual level, research shows that it is actually the educated and more well-off people who tend toward extremism. Daniel Pipes makes this connection: “Like fascism and Marxism-Leninism in their heydays, militant Islam attracts highly competent, motivated and ambitious individuals. Far from being the laggards of society, they are its leaders. … [S]uicide bombers who hurl themselves against foreign enemies offer their lives not to protest financial deprivation but to change the world” (National Interest, Winter 2001/2002). (Joel Hilliker, Is Islam a Threat?, February 2003.)

Here, then is the origin of the media’s story. For among the uneducated, poverty-stricken masses, Islamists are finding a goldmine of support. As Daniel Pipes put it, the poor “make valuable foot-soldiers” (ibid., Winter 2001/2002). (Islamism's Foot Soldiers, February 2003.)

It is a fact that the concept of Western civilization’s bloodguilt, established in the aftermath of Versailles, promoted a philosophy of appeasement that still flourishes today. This has produced what Daniel Pipes, writing for the New York Post, describes as a “self-hating weakness” which is destined to “lead again to disaster, no less than it did leading up to World War II” (Jan. 28). (Ron Fraser, World War Déjà Vu, March-April 2003.)

However, measure the way the Iraq campaign was fought against the history of warfare. As commentator Daniel Pipes wrote in a New York Post article (April 16), “traditional features of warfare have been turned upside-down.” (Joel Hilliker, Weakness in Victory, June 2003.)

The ultimate goal “is to apply the Islamic law (the Sharia) globally. In U.S. terms, it intends to replace the Constitution with the Koran” (Daniel Pipes, FrontPageMagazine.com, September 23). For a clear statement of this goal, Pipes points to a 1989 book written by an influential commentator on American Muslim issues named Siddiqi: “Siddiqi argues that Muslims taking control of the United States has more importance than such goals as sustaining the Iranian revolution or destroying Israel, for it has greater impact on the future of Islam” (Pipes, Militant Islam Reaches America). The prospect of uniting America’s material success with the “superb ideology” of Islam is deeply motivating to Siddiqi. (Joel Hilliker, Ugly Truths About Islamic Terrorism, December 2004.)

“Dutch attitudes toward Muslims immediately and dramatically hardened,” wrote commentator Daniel Pipes. “A poll found 40 percent of the population wanting the nearly million-strong Muslim community no longer to feel at home in the Netherlands. Double that number endorsed more stringent policies toward immigrants. De Telegraaf, a leading paper, published an editorial unimaginable before the Van Gogh murder calling for ‘a very public crackdown on extremist Muslim fanatics.’ Even left-wing politicians woke up to the need to speak ‘harsh truths’ about immigration, focusing on the disproportionate criminality of Muslims” (New York Sun, Nov. 16, 2004). (Joel Hilliker, Hate Triangle, January 2005.)

“This is a total perversion of the American public space, a blatant effort to suborn it to serve Islamic missionary purposes,” said Daniel Pipes, commentator on Middle Eastern issues (FrontPageMagazine.com, Nov. 24, 2004). (Islam: Schooling America, January 2005.)

Daniel Pipes comments, “Mr. Abbas shows tactical flexibility. Unlike Arafat, who could never let go of the terrorist tool that had brought him wealth, power and glory, Mr. Abbas sees the situation more cogently. If stopping the violence against Israel best serves his goal of eliminating the sovereign Jewish state, that is his program. He no more accepts what he so charmingly the other day called the ‘Zionist enemy’ than Arafat did (or Hamas, or Palestinian Islamic Jihad), but he is open to a multiplicity of means to destroy it” (New York Sun, January 11). (Joel Hilliker, New Hope in the Peace Process?, March-April, 2005.)

Daniel Pipes commented, “Mr. Abbas shows tactical flexibility. Unlike Arafat, who could never let go of the terrorist tool that had brought him wealth, power and glory, Mr. Abbas sees the situation more cogently. If stopping the violence against Israel best serves his goal of eliminating the sovereign Jewish state, that is his program. He no more accepts what he so charmingly the other day called the ‘Zionist enemy’ than Arafat did (or Hamas, or Palestinian Islamic Jihad), but he is open to a multiplicity of means to destroy it” (New York Sun, Jan. 11, 2005). (Gerald Flurry, Jerusalem in Prophecy, Chapter 2, 2001, 2005, 2010.)

[It is intriguing that Gerald Flurry uses a quote from an article by Joel Hilliker for one of his booklets. This is further evidence that Joel Hilliker serves as Gerald Flurry's ghostwriter.]

In their essay “The U.S. Government, Patron of Islam?”, Daniel Pipes and Mimi Tillman document the primary strands of what has emerged as U.S. policy regarding Islam. Politicians have been consistent in saying that there is nothing inherently threatening about the religion—that, in fact, Islam and terrorism are incompatible. Thus President Bush claims that Muslim scholars and the vast majority of clerics reject the extremist view and says that “[Islam’s] teachings are good and peaceful, and those who commit evil in the name of Allah blaspheme the name of Allah.” (Joel Hilliker, The Ostrich, the Warriors and the Whirlwind, January 2006.)

Daniel Pipes, a respected voice in Middle Eastern affairs, wrote an enlightening article discussing Ahmadinejad’s religious beliefs and how central they are to his leadership. (The Force Motivating Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, January 20, 2006.)

The New York Sun’s Daniel Pipes reports that although the lack of leadership and liberal stranglehold on higher education seems obvious in the recent Harvard debacle, assuming smaller institutions are freer of such domination is bad logic. His case study, Pennsylvania’s publicly funded Slippery Rock University—representative of the low and middle classes of post-secondary education—is wracked with politics and the influence of the diversity regime, as exposed in Slippery Rock professor Alan Levy’s report to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives’ committee on academic freedom. (Philip Nice and Robert Morley, The American University, June-July 2006.)

Daniel Pipes categorized Pew’s findings with three broad statements: (Joel Hilliker, Survey of Muslims Highlights Hatreds, June 29, 2006.)

Though the malignancy of radical Islamism is spreading in many non-Muslim nations—throughout Europe, North America and Southeast Asia in particular—in Britain the problem is uniquely bad. For its pathetic response to the incursion of militant Islam, commentator Daniel Pipes calls it the “weakest link in the Western chain.” (Joel Hilliker, The Sickness in Britain’s Heart, November-December, 2006.)

On Dec. 26, 2006, Middle East analyst Daniel Pipes warned that the West could lose the culture war with Islam, saying, “Should Islamists get smart and avoid mass destruction, but instead stick to the lawful, political, non-violent route, and should their movement remain vital, it is difficult to see what will stop them.” The West is barely able to maintain its determination to oppose active terrorism. How much effort will Britain exert to stop a rising symbol?

Pipes warned that pacifism, self-hatred and complacency are potentially fatal problems in the West. The conviction that “there is no military solution” is applied to every Middle East problem; self-hatred leads America and Britain to believe that terrorism is a just response to the evil of our governments; the lack of an organized military force among the Islamists breeds complacency. (Why London Doesn’t Need a Giant Mosque, January 17, 2007.)

When Daniel Pipes, a columnist who often writes pieces supporting Israel’s right to exist, spoke at the University of California–Irvine, dozens of students stood up and began yelling, bringing his lecture to a temporary halt. After leaving the room, the students gathered in the hall, where the staged protest’s leader condemned Pipes for hate speech and declared: “It’s just a matter of time before the State of Israel will be wiped off the face of the map.” Pipes often experiences such protests when he lectures at universities. Walid Shoebat, a former Palestinian Liberation Organization member who now supports Israel, has faced similar opposition and walkouts. (Mark Jenkins, Tyranny in Universities, June 2007.)

In truth, the assumption that Islamic terrorism is a product of poverty and deprivation has been proven false. Measuring wealth and economic trends nation by nation won’t tell you where Islamism will be weak or strong. Islamic terrorists are not opposed to wealth. But they are simply not interested in wealth in and of itself. “Economic assets for Islamists represent not the good life but added strength to do battle against the West,” wrote Daniel Pipes. “Money serves to train cadres and buy weapons, not to buy a bigger house or a late-model car. Wealth is a means, not an end” (National Interest, Winter 2001/2002). (David Vejil, Failed Car Bomb Plot Defies Conventional Wisdom, July 11, 2007.)

The experts and commentators that NRO consulted provide a number of interesting answers. One important detail emerged from Daniel Pipes’ answer. He linked to this New York Times piece from Saturday, which strongly indicated that the riots were actually orchestrated by the Muslim Sudanese government. (Riots Over a Teddy Bear Named Mohammed: Orchestrated by Sudan, December 3, 2007.)

Daniel Pipes takes up the provocative question of whether Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama was at one time a Muslim. After weighing the evidence he concludes,

Obama was an irregularly practicing Muslim who rarely or occasionally prayed with his step-father in a mosque. … [H]e for some years had a reasonably Muslim upbringing under the auspices of his Indonesian step-father. 

The ramifications of this revelation are important. Pipes documents one of them:

[I]f Obama once was a Muslim, he is now what Islamic law calls a murtadd (apostate), an ex-Muslim converted to another religion who must be executed. Were he elected president of the United States, this status, clearly, would have large potential implications for his relationship with the Muslim world. (The Weekend Web, January 13, 2008.)

[Obama is not a Muslim. It is not a "provocative question", it is simply untrue.]

As Daniel Pipes observes, “Indeed, Allam and Wilders may represent the vanguard of a Christian/liberal reassertion of European values. It is too soon to predict, but these staunch individuals could provide a crucial boost for those intent on maintaining the Continent’s historic identity” (Jerusalem Post, op. cit.). (Ron Fraser, Europe: Reacting to the Push, April 6, 2008.)

Recently, several signs have pointed to the fact that Europe is waking to the crisis. Daniel Pipes identified several of these in a recent column for the Jerusalem Post: (Europe: Waking to Crisis, April 11, 2008.)

Daniel Pipes, in a speech about radical Islamic methods at the World Summit on Counter-Terrorism at Herzliya, Israel, last month, noted that the Hamas terrorist organization—known for its refusal to negotiate with the West—took control of Gaza’s government through democratic elections. Then the group, which the West applauded for its democratization, took dictatorial control of the Strip with bullets. ... This “violence with lawful tactics” is the future of radical Islam, according to Pipes. ...

The vigilance needed to combat this warfare is woefully lacking in Britain. No number of counterterrorism conferences or speeches from enlightened thinkers like Daniel Pipes will change the decrepit mindset of Britain. (Victor Vejil and David Vejil, Radical Islam's Greatest Deception, October 7, 2008.)

Islamic affairs expert Daniel Pipes remarked on this on Sunday: “Monogamy, this ruling suggests, long a foundation of Western civilization, is silently eroding under the challenge of Islamic law. Should current trends continue, polygamy could soon be commonplace” (emphasis mine throughout). Pipes is not exaggerating: The British government now condones the primarily Muslim practice of polygamy. British welfare laws, for example, allow for husbands to collect state handouts for each wife! (Brad MacDonald, Is Britain Being Conquered From the Inside?, December 11, 2008.)

Daniel Pipes is dead-on in his assessment of Israel’s prospects for victory in its conflict with Hamas in his Jerusalem Post article today, “Israel’s Strategic Incompetence in Gaza.” While Hamas is taking hits, the outcome of this war still depends on the decisions the Israeli government makes from here, Pipes says. (The Weekend Web, January 11, 2009.)

All this is building toward a major break between the U.S. and Israel. Daniel Pipes points out that the Israeli government is strong enough that it is unlikely that it will cave in to America’s demands. Instead, it will go looking for new allies. For more information on where this split with America is leading, see our article “Band of Brothers.”(The Weekend Web, June 7, 2009.)

Daniel Pipes makes an interesting observation on his blog: that the last 200 years of history contain a number of examples of Europeans who defeated Muslims militarily and then claimed that their real intent was to protect and liberate. Napoleon, entering Alexandria in 1798, said, “I have come to restore your rights .… I respect God, his prophet, and the Koran.” Mussolini said in Italian-ruled Libya in 1937, “Italy will always be the friend and protector of Islam throughout the world.” Pipes alludes to the parallels with America’s forays into Muslim countries today (he wryly notes that the Muslims were never actually convinced that the foreigners had benign intentions). It’s worth noting, however, that we are seeing a repetition of this cycle today in Europe. The Continent is forging ties with Muslim peoples that biblical prophecy tells us it is actually going to end up conquering. (Brad MacDonald and Richard Palmer, The Weekend Web, August 9, 2009.)

Daniel Pipes, detailing these measures in his 2003 book Militant Islam Reaches America, concluded, “In adopting a determinedly apologetic stance, [federal officials] have made themselves an adjunct of the country’s Islamic organizations. By dismissing any connection between Islam and terrorism, complaining about media distortions, and claiming that America needs Islam, they have turned the U.S. government into a discreet missionary for the faith.” (Joel Hilliker, An Advocate for Islam, September 30, 2009.)

Middle East expert Daniel Pipes says Ahmadinejad’s religious fervor and unbending commitment to the return of the 12th imam ranks him among the most dangerous leaders in history. “The most dangerous leaders in modern history are those (such as Hitler) equipped with a totalitarian ideology and a mystical belief in their own mission. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad fulfills both these criteria .…” (Brad MacDonald, Ahmadinejad’s Apocalyptic Ambitions, October 8, 2009.)

It’s possible the Swiss government, facing pressure from other European governments as well as Muslim leaders and governments, will overturn the ban. Still, the vote was not insignificant. The “vote represents a possible turning point for European Islam,” noted expert on Islamic affairs Daniel Pipes. “That a large majority of those Swiss who voted on Sunday explicitly expressed anti-Islamic sentiment potentially legitimates such sentiments across Europe and opens the way for others to follow suit” (emphasis mine throughout). (Brad MacDonald, The Clash Is Coming, December 3, 2009.)

Thus, as commentator Daniel Pipes has brought out, the U.S. joined the list of Western nations since the 1989 Rushdie affair whose leaders have sacrificed their own country’s liberties in order to appease Muslims. The Obama administration’s “pressure on Mr. Jones further eroded freedom of speech about Islam and implicitly established Islam’s privileged status in the United States, whereby Muslims may insult others but not be insulted,” Pipes wrote. “Mr. Obama in effect enforced Islamic law, a precedent that could lead to other forms of compulsory sharia compliance.” (Joel Hilliker, Why ‘Burn a Koran Day’ Fizzled, October 6, 2010.)

It’s not just that country at risk of radicalization. As Daniel Pipes wrote, “This fast, seemingly easy, and relatively bloodless coup d’etat could inspire globally Islamists to sweep away their own tyrants.” In a region where religious extremism isn’t uncommon, people power isn’t necessarily a good thing. (Joel Hilliker, Tunisia’s Revolt Could Set the Region on Fire, January 19, 2011.)

After visiting Europe in February, Daniel Pipes, an Islamic affairs expert, reported, “Perhaps alone in the coterie focused on the Islamist threat to Europe, I am cheerful these days. That’s because I see the anti-Islamist reaction growing even more quickly than the Islamist threat itself.” (Joel Hilliker, Europe Must Reclaim the Mediterranean, April 2011.)

With all the many factions competing for power, Daniel Pipes, director of the Middle East Forum, believes anarchy, after the sort in Somalia and Afghanistan, is more likely than civil war. “Yemeni Islamists range from members of the Islah party, which competes in parliamentary elections, to the Houthi rebels fighting Saudi forces, to al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Their growing power boosts the Iranian-backed ‘resistance bloc’ of states and organizations,” he writes. (Joel Hilliker, Is Yemen Sliding Toward Anarchy?, June 16, 2011.)

Daniel Pipes fears that Western forces may have “brought civilization’s worst enemies to power” (The Week in Review, August 26, 2011.)

Middle East expert Daniel Pipes explained, “The NATO intervention [in Libya] in March 2011 was done without due diligence as to who it is in Benghazi that it was helping. … Chances are good that Islamist forces are hiding behind more benign elements, waiting for the right moment to pounce .… I fear that a dead-end despotism will be replaced by the agents of a worldwide ideological movement. I fear that Western forces will have brought civilization’s worst enemies to power” (emphasis added throughout). (Brad MacDonald, After Qadhafi—What Next?, October 2011.)

“American foreign policy is in unprecedented free-fall,” wrote analyst Daniel Pipes, “with a feckless and distracted White House barely paying attention to the outside world, and when it does, acting in an inconsistent, weak and fantastical manner. If one were to discern something so grand as an Obama Doctrine, it would read: ‘Snub friends, coddle opponents, devalue American interests, seek consensus, and act unpredictably’” (Nov. 12, 2013). (Joel Hilliker, What Happens After a Superpower Dies?, January 2014.)

Middle East expert Daniel Pipes explained the looming disaster as genocide by way of “terminal dehydration.” Cutting off a nation’s water supply is potentially fatal in its severity and indiscriminate in its victims. The dry and arid regions of northeastern Syria will quickly empty if one of the most basic necessities of human life dries up. The problem extends beyond Syria.

Much of Iraq’s freshwater supply originates in Turkey and flows through Syria before it is collected in dams in Iraq. If these dams experience a sharp drop in water and pressure, they could collapse. Daniel Pipes said that if one of these dams, the Mosul Dam, collapsed parts of Baghdad itself would be under water within a few hours. Within two hours, the city of Mosul, home to 1.7 million Iraqis, would be a Mideast Atlantis. (Callum Wood, Turkey Dries Up the Euphrates, June 11, 2014.)

***

And so it is clear that Daniel Pipes is PCG's main link to the Islamophobia Network.

All Humanity Marry



Here is an inspiring passage describing some of the surprising things all of humanity share. It is from The Language Hoax: Why the World Looks the Same in Any Language by John H. McWhorter (2014, pp. 160-1).
Anthropologist Donald Brown's catalog of human universals is invaluable here. It will surprise few that all humans have art or use tools. However, many of the things that have been found in all human groups worldwide are not what one would expect, and make one feel part of a species defined by much more than physiognomy and the infant's instinct to cry. For example, in all groups there is an equivalent to marriage; nowhere do people engage solely in informal sexual arrangements. All humans have a particular fear of snakes. All groups have a kind of music associated with children and child care. There is no human group that does not indulge occasionally in some kind of stimulant or intoxicant. The facial expressions a woman makes when flirting are the same the world over. To consider excretion and sex private acts is not solely a Western "hangup," but is found among all human beings everywhere. Linguistically, some languages say "not good" for bad, "not wide" for narrow, and so on, but none have negative terms as the default for basic concepts like these: no language has "not bad" for good, "not narrow" for wide.
The study cited is Human Universals by Donald E. Brown (1991).

Considering that all of humanity "have a kind of music associated with children and child care" how dare demagogues like Gerald Flurry and Joel Hilliker vilify children as may be seen in the following words. PCG's leaders often express very negative views of Muslims (see here, here and here), even vilifying their children as is seen below.
They woefully ignore several pressing realities: that the Palestinian children of which the president speaks are being raised on virulent Jew hatred... (Joel Hilliker, "Obama in Israel", March 23, 2013.)

Think for a moment about the people within Islamist culture today. They are raising their children—from the time they are little babies—to hate, even to murder. Those young people constantly hear that message of hatred, and they become more evil as they grow older. They say they want to wipe Israel (biblical Judah) off the face of the Earth! (Gerald Flurry, The Former Prophets: How to Become a King, Chapter 2, 2014, p. 30.)
Considering that "in all groups there is an equivalent to marriage; nowhere do people engage solely in informal sexual arrangements" why do Armstrongite demagogues fear monger about sexual relations they disapprove of as though things were getting worse (here is one example courtesy of the late John Ogwyn from LCG) when marriage or its equivalents are so universal and thus will never go away?