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Post by Deleted on May 5, 2013 18:46:12 GMT 10
Hillsong - the church with no answersWhen a former member of the Hillsong congregation started asking hard questions, she was thrown out, writes David Marr. By the miracle of YouTube, we can take a helicopter ride over Sydney any time we like with Pastor Brian Houston as he lays out Hillsong's Vision 2007. In a voice that has coaxed fortunes from the faithful, he talks prosperity, vision, growth and God's strategy as the helicopter swoops down on the "beautiful piece of property" Hillsong bought last year in inner-city Rosebery for $28 million. "I think the finances are where we're going to have to have the greatest faith." His confidence is absolute that the mortgage will soon be paid. To a sceptical outsider, Houston looks oddly like Spike Milligan with cans on his ears and a microphone to his mouth as he looks down on the suburbs where Hillsong's "state-of-the-art worship centres" are booming already or will soon be delivering the goods for Christ. He shrugs off ridicule. The nation's most triumphant preacher lives in a world without doubt and without dissent. "Jesus said a house divided against itself cannot stand," Houston reminds the thousands who have viewed this film clip and left adoring messages behind. ("Please come to Sweden! We need 'fire' here!!!!!!!!!") Authority is a big deal at Hillsong. You don't mess with Brian or his wife, Bobbie. "The great strength of our church has always been our unity. A single vision is critical to where we're going." So Tanya Levin is a problem. She asks questions. She wants explanations. She challenges the vision of Hillsong's leadership. In short, she's trouble. Two years into writing People in Glass Houses, her insider's account of Hillsong, she was finally - and literally - shown the door. "There is no debate within Hillsong," she says. "That's fundamentalism. It's not open to free thought and question, not at all." www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/08/03/1185648145760.html
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Post by Deleted on May 5, 2013 19:38:42 GMT 10
This is a damning article.
Its nothing but manipulation and a massive ripoff.
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Post by Deleted on May 5, 2013 22:39:55 GMT 10
2007?
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2013 11:32:52 GMT 10
Nothing has changed.
Have you read it all the way through?
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2013 20:47:21 GMT 10
Read years ago, already rejected.
NEXT!
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2013 20:50:34 GMT 10
My only criticism of Hillsong is their teaching against gays and lesbians,which turns away these people from church. We should instead love them, accept them with open arms, and pray for healing in their lives.
We don't know the reason why they are homosexual, we don't know what has turned their sexual desires into perverted desires, but through prayer they can be healed.
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2013 20:59:15 GMT 10
Read years ago, already rejected. NEXT! are you saying its all lies?
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2013 21:00:58 GMT 10
My only criticism of Hillsong is their teaching against gays and lesbians,which turns away these people from church. We should instead love them, accept them with open arms, and pray for healing in their lives. We don't know the reason why they are homosexual, we don't know what has turned their sexual desires into perverted desires, but through prayer they can be healed. but ripping people off with mass mind control and sex abuse there is ok? its all nothing but mass hypnosis and bullshit
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2013 21:05:30 GMT 10
My only criticism of Hillsong is their teaching against gays and lesbians,which turns away these people from church. We should instead love them, accept them with open arms, and pray for healing in their lives. We don't know the reason why they are homosexual, we don't know what has turned their sexual desires into perverted desires, but through prayer they can be healed. but ripping people off with mass mind control and sex abuse there is ok? its all nothing but mass hypnosis and bullshit Sex abuse? Brian's father was kicked out!
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2013 21:13:57 GMT 10
he sexually abused people there for years
and there will be others - those people are crackpots and sex abuse of children goes with your false Zombie worship.
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2013 21:21:32 GMT 10
so the sexual abuse is OK there - and all the mass hypnosis and mind control and ripping people off is all good
so long as its is in the name of the Zombie - who never existed in the first place.
So when birds - that are dinosaurs are claiming territory and attracting a mate - to you they are praising your Zombie.
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Post by jody on May 6, 2013 21:27:44 GMT 10
sex abuse, fraud etc etc etc happens everywhere and within non religious groups.
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2013 21:44:09 GMT 10
yes of course jody
but Churches are institutions where it happens all the time and hidden.
Hillsong rips off tens of millions every year by exploitation and manipulation - the whole thing is fraud
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Post by slartibartfast on May 6, 2013 23:08:11 GMT 10
sex abuse, fraud etc etc etc happens everywhere and within non religious groups. Systematic sexual abuse of children is more prevalent in religious groups than non-religious groups. Especially the cover-up thereof from the top down.
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Post by Deleted on May 7, 2013 2:03:04 GMT 10
sex abuse, fraud etc etc etc happens everywhere and within non religious groups. Systematic sexual abuse of children is more prevalent in religious groups than non-religious groups. Especially the cover-up thereof from the top down. Just the Catholic cult. Other religious organizations are within the community average.
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Post by pim on May 7, 2013 8:51:58 GMT 10
It isn't "just" the Catholic "cult", Matt. The Catholic Church is the biggest single confessional group within Australia so naturally the stats are going to show a much higher level of abuse there.
By saying Just the Catholic cult you're glossing over the complexity in favour of your own ideological blinkers.
Consider this: what these enquiries ar starting to show (as if we didn't know that already but it's good to have it officially stated and backed up with hard evidence) is that the abuse and the cover-ups have been systemic going back decades. As the full horror emerges, it becomes evident that it isn't something new, and that its long history as part of the culture is an important part of the horror.
Our story here in Australia bears appalling similarities with the situation in the United States and you have to ask what does Australian Catholicism have in common with US Catholicism that produces these parallels? To me it's the Irish influence. Yes I know that post WW2 multiculturalism has diluted the Irish strain but Catholicism in Australia has been Irish from the beginning as it has been in the US. It's the reason both countries make a fuss of St Patrick's Day when other heavily Catholic countries like Italy and Spain wouldn't even know who St Patrick was.
The recent enquiry in Ireland lifted the lid on an appalling Dystopia of horrors within the Catholic Church in Ireland, and during evidence given in Newcastle (NSW) yesterday by Det Chief Insp Fox on the sexul depradations of those two dead priests, the scale of whose sexual predations on kids had to be heard to be believed, it emerged that no sooner had they arrived in Australia from Ireland (!!) in the late 1940s than they started hurting kids. I've heard of a few cases like this over the years, of Irish priests targeting kids. Having been brought up Catholic in Australia it used to be commonplace that Catholic priests had Irish accents. I wonder if clerical child abuse isn't a tragic part of Ireland's legacy to Australia. They've always had that problem and they shared it with whatever countries they exported their priests to - and that would include not just Australia and the US, but also Canada and NZ.
I don't think clerical celibacy is the "smoking gun". To forego the pleasures of the flesh may just be part of a spiritual asceticism in an individual. Gandhi is said to have abandoned sex early in the piece - dunno if he consulted his wife on this or just informed her - and it was part of the austere ascetic nature of his spirituality. Nobody ever suggested he abused children.
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Post by Occam's Spork on May 7, 2013 9:41:07 GMT 10
but Churches are institutions where it happens all the time and hidden. Overstated. It's never happened in any of the Churches that I've attended.
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Post by Deleted on May 7, 2013 10:42:30 GMT 10
Sexual abuse does go on in ALL demoninations.
At an earlier incarnation of News Talkback, I used to post every news story of child abuse and acts of sexual perversion by church officials that resulted in court cases in NZ. I posted stories involving Catholics, Methodists, Presbyterians, Salvation Army, Lutherans, Open Brethrens, Exclusive Brethrens, Anglicans, Baptists, Mormons, Christian Scientists, and others. Altair used to slag off at me as being anti-religion for bringing it out into the open. Presumably Altair, like the Catholics, preferred it to be swept beneath the carpet.
And we all know about Hillsong's history. And that is just the cases where an offender has been caught. There will be plenty more who haven't yet been caught.
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Post by jody on May 7, 2013 10:44:29 GMT 10
Yes it does KTJ....even atheism
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Post by Deleted on May 7, 2013 10:53:44 GMT 10
Pim, I am talking on a per-capita basis, it is much higher in the Catholic cult.
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Post by pim on May 7, 2013 11:15:40 GMT 10
I don't really know about "per capita basis". I'll ignore your references to "cult". It's the Irish connection that I'm referring to. To what extent is the abuse of children by Catholic clergy over many decades an outcome of Ireland exporting its own "Irish disease"?
And just as important. probably even more important, is the emerging evidence of police and DPP involvement in the cover ups over many years, and what that means for the notion of the separation of church and state.
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Post by Occam's Spork on May 7, 2013 11:25:32 GMT 10
Sexual abuse does go on in ALL demoninations.
At an earlier incarnation of News Talkback, I used to post every news story of child abuse and acts of sexual perversion by church officials that resulted in court cases in NZ. I posted stories involving Catholics, Methodists, Presbyterians, Salvation Army, Lutherans, Open Brethrens, Exclusive Brethrens, Anglicans, Baptists, Mormons, Christian Scientists, and others. Altair used to slag off at me as being anti-religion for bringing it out into the open. Presumably Altair, like the Catholics, preferred it to be swept beneath the carpet.
And we all know about Hillsong's history. And that is just the cases where an offender has been caught. There will be plenty more who haven't yet been caught. Even so, its unfair to judge an entire religion or philosophy based on it's abuse.
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Post by Deleted on May 7, 2013 11:40:45 GMT 10
6% of all Roman Catholic priests sexually abuse children.
The Catholic Church knows this and has always known this and kept it hidden and moved them to fresh ground and provided them with new children and protection.
I would say that is damning for the Roman Catholic Church as an entity.
It goes on the in Anglican Church and the same thing happened.
It goes on in all Churches and in the US the rate is the same in all churches as it is in the RCC.
I think it is entirely fair to judge a religion or philosophy by the atrocities it commits.
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Post by Deleted on May 7, 2013 12:03:55 GMT 10
I should have also mentioned the Boy Scouts of America.
They are a sort-of quasi-religious organisation with a disgusting history of sexually abusing boys in their care.
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Post by pim on May 7, 2013 12:17:29 GMT 10
Matthew 18:6
I don't think that's codswallop
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