False Prophet Ronald Weinland

At a couple of points during Insane Lying False Prophet Ronald Weinland’s sermon last Saturday, he took pot shots at some of the leaders of competing CoGs.  He dug up some old copies of his News Watch magazines from 1998 and 1999.  From the sermon:

[Reading from page 5 of the Jan '99 issue of News Watch]“The large organizations will no longer be functioning as they are today.  On the contrary, even now they are nearing their end.”

[Commenting extemporaneously] Now people can mock and make fun of that.  1999 – Hah, they’re nearing their end.  A lot truer today than it was then.  How near is near?  Ten years?  Eleven years?  Is that not near?  Amazing how human beings are sometimes, now haughty human beings are.  Some who like to poke fun at and make fun of some of what is said in one area of the thunders about certain leaders of the church.  It’s coming.  It’s coming.  In God’s time.  According to God’s will.

The “area of the thunders” Ron referred to is the first phase of the fifth thunder of the 6th seal.   During the first phase of the fifth thunder, Rod Meredith, Richard Ames (both of Living CoG), Gerald Flurry (Philadelphia CoG), David Pack (Restored Cog), and John Ritenbaugh (CGG) were to die early on.  This is all described on page 107-108 of 2008 – God’s Final Witness and offered as a test of himself as a prophet “How much more specific can one be to show that he is either of God, and indeed His prophet, or someone who has clearly stepped over the line to be dealt with by God in a speedy manner. Time will tell! And, you don’t have long to wait!”

As described in 2008 – God’s Final Witness “This phase of the Fifth Thunder is one of my own choosing, which God has granted me as part of His own will and purpose for the Church”.  Well, it’s over 3 years since the book was released in November of 2006, and over a year since the 6th seal ended for the second time, and we’re still waiting as none of these accursed CoG leaders are dead.  Not mocking or making fun of, just pointing out something for those who have eyes to see.  God didn’t grant Insane Lying False Prophet Ronald Weinland anything.

Ron wasn’t done.  He took additional pot shots at John Ritenbaugh for counting Pentecost a week differently a few years.  And then he went on to mention a “minister from Missouri”.

Ron started his globe trotting with a trip to Europe in November of 1999 using Steve Dalrymple’s air miles.   Ron mentioned that during that trip he used Benjamin and Grace’s home in greater London to conduct a Bible study which was attended by a number* of people including Phillip Burman who is still one of Ron’s elders.  The group in the UK now is fewer than 50, most of whom joined in 2007 and 2008 after Ron started promoting his book, so I doubt that very many of those attending Ron’s Bible study went with PKG.  Any friendships that Benjamin and Grace had with others in that small group are now ended by edict of Sheriff Ron.  * (According to Saturday’s sermon, 19 people were at the meeting in London in 1999.  According to the sermon of Dec 5, 1999 there were 12 people including 3 children.)

Ron continued on in last week’s sermon:

“It was at this time [1999] that we invited that minister from Missouri to be there during Thanksgiving while we were away.  And while we were away, the mice did play.  Because they started hatching up division while we were gone, while we were in Europe.  And they began to spread things around a bit here and there.  And they began to talk amongst themselves.  About what I was doing and I was their minister and I should be there and I shouldn’t be anyplace else and I shouldn’t go anyplace else, because he’s our minister.  And basically he should do what we tell him to do.  Little did he know what God was

While Ron was in Europe, he missed two sermons.  On November 20, 1999 Al Buchanan delivered a sermon titled “Children of the Light” to “the Church of God” in Toledo.  Al Buchanan was the minister of the Belleville CoG (a suburb of St. Louis in Illinois).  By all accounts, Al is not an empire builder.  In fact a few weeks after this last Feast of Tabernacles he stepped down, stating that he felt his little CoGlet was encouraging division within Armstrongism.  This just points up Ron’s paranoia.  Ron, just because you’re plotting doesn’t mean that everyone else is.

On the other hand, it was just over two months after Ron’s first European trip as a prophet that he seized control of the Church of God Inc from its lay board during January and February of 2000. Ron the cat swallowed the church whole and spit out the mice.

During Ron’s sermon this past week, he quoted from various issues of News Watch.  Here’s one potshot against CoGs that he didn’t quote.  From the June-July 1999 issue on page 3 (336kB PDF Download):

Today some believe they are to give a warning witness to Israel.  What a puny effort we see.  If and when God gives a witness to Israel, more than He already has, you will know it.  Israel has already received the height of a warning witness given through the Philadelphia period of time, and they rejected it.  That is a witness against them!

The next witness will be obvious. It will be when God needs no Church to help sponsor nor support it.  There will be such miraculous events accomplished at that time that much free publicity will be given. The work of that witness will consist of such newsworthy events that it will be widely reported in this world.  There will be no need for an organization to sponsor such efforts.

That future witness to Israel will be one that reminds them of the earlier witness they refused during the Philadelphia era.  It will tell them why they are then suffering once the physical tribulation has begun.  It will also be a message to the whole world of what is soon to follow – the Kingdom of God on earth with the soon coming of Jesus Christ as King of kings.  That job has been set aside for two to accomplish by the power of God.  No church organization is going to do it, and no individual is going to be able to set himself up as God’s apostle to do it. It is for the two who are yet to be sent by God.

Ron sure doesn’t skimp on his irony pills.  Ron, here you have it.  It’s all your fault that the Great Tribulation hasn’t started.  You don’t need the COG-PKG.  Turn it over to Johnny and strike out on your own exercising your awesome Witness powers.  When you and Laura are on your way out of town to call down plagues on world capitols, Y’ALL can stop off to breathe fire on that nasty IRS special agent who keeps serving Audra with summonses.

In fulfillment of his self-appointed Matthew 24:14 commission (And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.), Herbert Armstrong traveled to Beijing not once but twice to meet with Chinese leaders.  I found a recording on the Internet of his speech from his first visit to China, 30 years ago this week.

The 26-minute recording (MP3 download) includes an introduction by Stan Rader, a welcome by a Chinese official, and translations between Chinese and English.  After all that is taken out, HWA’s speech is less than 10 minutes.  Did Herbie fulfill his commission by preaching about Jesus?  He talked a lot about societal ills and the dangers of nuclear weapons, but the closest he got to talking about the return of Christ was in his conclusion of his talk:

Some time ago the editor of a weekly news magazine in the United States said in an editorial that now our number one problem is that of survival of the human race.  And he said it would seem now that the only hope that we have in the world would be the sudden intervention of a strong unseen hand from some place.  Now I have the pleasure to announce to you tonight, not to try to convince you but to announce to you, that what some of the leading scientists say is our only hope [a single one-world government] is going to happen, and that unseen hand is going to appear and we are going to have world peace in our time.

All of the troubles in this world have come from living the wrong way.  Having the wrong attitude toward ourselves, toward others, toward one another.  And we’re going to come to the time of world peace.  We’re going to have a utopia on earth.  People will laugh when I say the word “utopia”.  Why should it be impossible?  Why should we not have it?  All we have to do is live the way we ought to, and all of us are going to be doing that and in our time in this generation.

Well I’m not here to convince anybody of anything.  I’m merely here to make an announcement.  And to tell you that that is coming.  And peace and happiness and joy is coming.  We’re going to learn the way to live.  We’re going to begin to live that way. And it is coming in our time.  That is the world’s only hope and that’s what I’m proclaiming around the world.  Thank you very, very much. [Polite applause after the translation.]

Now 30 years after he made these statements and 24 years after his death, we can add these statements to the “Herbert Armstrong was a false prophet” column. But Herbie made no mention of Christ, just a vague notion of “strong unseen hand from some place”.  And this is backed up by a statement in Mystery of the Ages on page 28:

As I write I recently returned from my second four-day visit in Beijing (Peking),…  I did not try to tell them who and what God is, but I did tell two large and important audiences of leaders what God is very soon going to do.

And for that Herbie probably spent for aviation fuel for his jet, bribes, etc several times what my father has paid in tithes during a half-century of being an Armstrongite.  But wait, there’s even more.  According to Ron Weinland, Herbie ate pork  and another source indicates it was at one of those events. “This was the rationale Herbert Armstrong reportedly used when he went to China and ate pork with the Chinese leaders.” Speaking in a sermon from 2002, Weinland said (MP3 download, 19 minutes into file)

… what is the balance?  Talked about Mr. Armstrong — eating pork.  Once.  Before a king.  …. Brother, there has not been a man closer to God in the last 100 years than Mr. Armstrong was.  And who of us, any of us, has the audacity and the gall to judge and condemn that man?

I do. I condemn Armstrong.   HWA invented a religion with elements and even literature plagiarized from others.  He siphoned off tithe money from his followers with some forced to borrow money to make it through their third tithe year.  He exposed several generations to the fear of his false prophecies. And when it came time to stand up for his doctrine against unclean foods and to explicitly fulfill his “commission” to preach the gospel, he fell down on both counts, eating pork in Peking and being vague on the gospel.

I recall a minister giving a feast sermon in the 60′s about how it was OK to eat pork to avoid offending a host, and then being required give a sermon correcting himself (David Antion IIRC).  Hypocritical Herb.

And Ron follows in his spiritual idol’s footsteps with his own version of hypocrisy.  Fortunately Weinland’s following is smaller, yet still too large.

How Screwed Up Are You? is the title of  a guest post on the Ambassador Watch blog.  This post was written by Dennis Diehl.  Dennis was formerly a WCG minister but since has “thought differently” about that.  The difference is that Dennis has actually repented, not merely regretted the way Ron does.  I believe that Dennis became a WCG minister about a decade before Ron did but hasn’t made anywhere near as much money from his ministerial career.

Dennis’ post relates to the effects of prophecy on people, whether promoted by “The Spokesman Witness” or one of the other false prophets who resulted from Herbert Armstrong’s own promotions. I recommend clicking on over and reading what Dennis has to say.  And perhaps leave a comment there, although it will be a short while before it shows up as webmaster Gavin has had set up comment moderation to deal with a few whackos who’ve posted there.

A few weeks ago, False Prophet Ronald Weinland gave part 2 of a sermon series called “Judgment”.  I don’t know how he’s edited the sermon since I downloaded it from the PKG website during the following week,  so I’m providing the version I downloaded.  The following quotes are from a segment beginning at about 1 hour and 39 minutes in this MP3 file (Right-Click the link, then Save-As to download to your hard drive).

“When you get into conversations, we’re not all going to be on the same page.  And we don’t have to correct each other in everything that’s said……  So we give people time and just let some things go by the wayside unless it’s going to cause real harm or great damage.”

A bit later, at 1 hour and 43 minutes in the sermon MP3:

“Another one is: maybe it’s because of something physical that they’re weak.  As an example I’ve know of people because of their bodies, because people who know their bodies, see.  Don’t you love it when people come along and they have to tell you they tell you what to do to have better health yourself  that they see you doing wrong.  ….. Sometimes people get all worked up about those things, ….   You don’t want to give a doubtful disputation and start butting heads.“

Let’s compare Weinland’s teachings to the experiences of a couple I’ll call “John and Jane Doe”.  The first part of their story was related on the Weinland Watch blog, as the “Does” started attending CoG-PKG early in 2005  and later attended the Feast of Tabernacles where Weinland rolled out his Origin-of-Christ doctrine.  Here is some more of their story, as related by “Jane”:

Between DUB and Pentecost, we had the opportunity to see Weinland in person for a church service. The service itself was uneventful, but after the service the brethren were gathering for a meal at a member’s nearby home and we inadvertently offended Weinland for the first of two times.

Our family has dietary sensitivities making it difficult to eat at restaurants and even most food that most folks eat and would serve in their homes. For this reason, we always travel prepared to feed ourselves when we are out and about. This day being no different, we came prepared with the food we needed. We also were not anticipating this invitation. Anyway, we were happy to be included with the brethren, but when we politely declined most of the food served,

Weinland was not happy. We later learned that he felt we should have abandoned our special dietary restrictions and should have just eaten what was offered us so as not to offend our hostess. Be assured, we are very accustomed to dealing with situations like this and we have learned how to tactfully decline food we can’t eat.

The story continues with the “Does” attending the 2005 Feast of Tabernacles.

As I mentioned earlier, our family follows a special diet due to numerous sensitivities. Eating out is very difficult for us. CoG-PKG has a standing tradition of a buffet dinner on the first and last holy days. Again we inadvertently offended Weinland when we did not attend the buffet on the first holy day. We had no idea that attendance at these buffets was expected and almost seemed mandatory.

In the middle of the Feast after services one day, our family was leaving the hotel for the afternoon. I took our children out to the parking lot to our vehicle.  When quite some time passed and my husband did not join us, I went back in to the hotel to find him. I found him in the hallway just outside the conference room talking to Weinland. I can’t tell you what transpired before I happened upon them.  But as I stood there a few feet away from them listening to the conversation in progress, I was absolutely stunned.

Weinland was in the process of threatening my husband with disfellowshipment if he did not bring his family to the buffet dinner scheduled for the Last Great Day. Not only was my husband being ordered to bring his family, but he was also being told that he must allow our children to eat anything and everything they desired regardless of the impact or affect on their fragile health. My husband was told to decide quickly whether or not he would comply because if he decided not to comply he would not be welcome back at services.

My husband reacted to Weinland’s tactics by saying something about NEVER having been treated this way by a minister before. To this Weinland coldly retorted: “You have never dealt with a TRUE minister of God before.”

While witnessing this exchange between Weinland and my husband, it was very obvious that Weinland began to attempt to use my presence to unnerve my husband. Many things he said were said to try to influence me against my husband.

We left the hotel that day shaken and not sure what we should do. In the end, my husband acquiesced and we continued to attend the rest of the Feast. On the Last Great Day we went to the buffet. Our children made us proud that day by making decisions about what they ate that did not have any harmful affects on their health. Under Weinland’s watchful eye our family ate our mid-day meal without incident.

The Feast concluded and we returned home feeling like we had made a huge error in judgment to think that PKG was where we belonged.

For whatever reason, we did continue to listen to Weinland for a few more weeks. Until his WITNESS announcement, that is. That, I’m happy to say, was the last straw and we haven’t listened since.

“John” and “Jane”, I’m glad that you made your escape from this false prophet.  Weinland is no longer attempting to force you to eat the physical food to which you’re allergic, nor eat at his table of spiritual garbage.   I expect the experience has given you the defenses to stay out of the snare of another such false prophet.  Thank you for sharing your story.

I’m going to let Ronnie have the last word on the topic (brief audio clip).  That is before you comment.

This is the third in a series of posts (Part One , Part Two) on Weinland’s governance tactics during his 2000 takeover of The Church of God Inc.   One of the former board members of The Church of God Inc. summarized the conflict succinctly.  Paraphrasing heavily:

“The entire issue was that Ron wanted one-man rule.  We weren’t having any part of that.“

One reference Weinland has made several times when discussing former associations is about “walking side-by-side to God’s house, in counsel blended sweet”.  This is a misquotation from Dwight Armstrong’s song “But As For Me, I’ll Call on God” which is derived from Psalm 55:14 “We took sweet counsel together, and walked unto the house of God in company.”  To me the terms “sweet counsel together” or “counsel blended sweet” means a civil discussion where everyone’s opinion is respected and the truth determined.  Ron’s version of “counsel blended sweet” is when his followers counsel each other to observe the latest pronouncement from the mouth of their spiritual idol.

xHWA, who has contributed comments on this blog, was actually there during these events. I’m going to let xHWA contribute most of the material in this post.  First is some new material which summarizes an email exchange between Weinland and xHWA after the split.  After that, I have compiled some of xHWA’s comments on the previous post so you don’t have to sort them out from the other comments.

After the tumultuous events of Feb 5, 2000 and the following week, the bleeding still had not ended.  Life continued on, as xHWA relates:

We had a wedding to attend of a young lady whose family was split by this – half staying with Ron and half leaving. Ron refused to talk to us. He refused to shake my hand. He even tried to avoid eye contact. Then he left immediately after the service. .

xHWA has provided a copy of his email exchange with Ron Weinland after the wedding.  Here it is (emphasis mine):

(more…)

During the sermon of the following week, February 5, the tone changed. Early in February 5th’s sermon, Ron states that he knows there will be a split, no doubt about it. Those who don’t accept Ron should find another pastor. He canceled a trip to Tyler, Texas that weekend to stay in Toledo and deal with this grave crisis.

During the prior week’s sermon Ron had stated that he wasn’t going to hide anything by not sending out cassette tapes as normal. On February 5, Weinland said that he wasn’t sure whether or not he was going to send them out. Ron titled the sermon “For Unity, Nothing Will Remain Hidden.”  (Just in case you missed the irony, reread the paragraph.)

Weinland challenged the members by telling them that if they thought they were going to keep everything, they weren’t. He had corrected the board. The board had the gall to push Ron to find his true position, and he had pushed back with strength and authority by disfellowshipping some of them.

He read a letter from one of the board members that was very critical of Ron. After that, a survey was handed out among the congregation, asking whether the member agreed or disagreed with the following statements:

• I have seen your [Weinland's] fruit for the past few years and believe that you have been following Jesus Christ.
• I do not believe in a congregationalist form of government ….., but believe that those matters are guided by Jesus Christ through His ministry
• The issues before us is whether the congregation or the ministry administer the government …, I believe I need more time to study and pray about the subject in order to come to a definite conviction one way or the other.

(Downloadable PDF copy of the survey) After the surveys were collected, there was an intermission as Ron adjourned for 20 minutes or so to read them. When he returned, he had envelopes addressed to a number of members. Inside the envelope was a letter (downloadable copy). Without computer equipment or adequate time, these were obviously prepared in advance. Weinland spent the remainder of the sermon reading from the letter.

The letter reiterated his position and reasoning and then announced that those receiving the letter were not disfellowshiped but were no longer members in “good standing”. It ended with:

As this letter has been addressed to you, you know whether this probation period is being given because you need more time to prove matters to yourself or whether you have state [sic] opposition to this ministry, either directly or by divisive action on your part. ….. This probation period of seven week [sic], beginning with this Sabbath, means that you are no longer classified as a member in “good standing” until this matter is resolved.

Ron took an aside to point out that as members not in “good standing”, they were not eligible to vote during the corporate meeting the following weekend on whether to replace the bylaws with the Ron-friendly version.

He closed with: “With genuine love for full reconciliation and in the service of Jesus Christ.” One estimate is that about 3/4 of the approximately 20 families in attendance were made members not in “good standing”. That did not end matters, though what transpired after is less clear.

MP3 copies of the sermons are available for playing or downloading (right-click, then save-as to your hard drive).

• Jan 29, 2000 Part 1
• Jan 29, 2000 Part 2
• Feb 5, 2000

Weinland “left the building” after the services and serving notices.  The members remained for awhile to sort through their reaction to these developments. In a letter dated Feb 7 (PDF download), Ron explained the reasons for the suspension of membership in the third paragraph:

The reason for giving those letters was based on what I believed to be the only option open to me to protect the church. Some people needed more time to pray and study about these matters and this seemed to be the only legal means to insure that they could, while at the same time protecting the best interest of the Church.

So the reason for this ecclesiastical action was not ecclesiastical, it was legal. Ron presumes to determine the best interest of the Church. Never mind that the bylaws set up a board of directors to handle the financial interests of the Church. In the fourth paragraph, Weinland talks about further ecclesiastical actions to seize legal control, talking about how he quelled a movement to have an emergency board meeting to fire Ron:

I had to explain to the individual seeking to call the Board meeting that his efforts were now futile, as I had already started the procedure to disfellowship one Board member and that I would not hesitate to disfellowship any other Board members who continued to threaten the welfare of the Church.

Lawyers were fully involved at this point, with Ron naming his own multi-partnered law firm. He defended his actions as being legal, and that the bylaws gave him great power. But after consultation with his attorneys, he had reached a new understanding of the legal situation and did not need to deal with the members. The only thing needed for him to control the situation was to disfellowship board members of the corporation which hired him. This allowed him to reinstate the members, never mind their spiritual deficiencies.

By this statement, he acknowledged that the letters handed out the prior Saturday were a legal maneuver rather than an ecclesiastical action. He ended this letter with “In Christ’s service and deep love to all”.

Weinland’s legal power was based on precedent, with no mention of any disfellowshipping powers given in the bylaws.  Therefore a matter that could be litigated. With litigation threatened, it seems that there was some negotiation that followed.  First there appeared to be an agreement that the departing local members would keep their share of the funds or about 1/3 of the corporation assets. Then Weinland changed his mind and said he would let them have a much smaller amount, calling it a gift. It’s unclear as to whether the splitters received anything at all in the end.

Further details on the turmoil from the opposite camp’s view is available in this post on the Weinland Watch blog and the comments of this post on As Bereans Did.

In a letter dated February 14, 2000 (PDF download) Weinland sent out the tapes for the prior two week’s sermons after all. These letterheads on all these letters included the phrase “Preparing for the Kingdom of God” as a slogan under the Church/corporate name “the Church of God”(Inc). (The logo was created by one of Terry Wrozek’s daughters. Terry became one of Weinland’s first “elders”, formerly delivering several sermons each year, but has not delivered one since October, 2007. During all the promotions of 2008, he was bypassed as others were promoted to evangelist and senior elder. Ron rectified this partially in the past week, rewarding his long-time ally and elder with a spot as senior elder.)

In letter, Ron indicated that there was an attempt by “some” to take control of the corporation.  Yes, there was an attempt.  But it was not an attempt by “some”, it was an attempt by “one”, Ronald Weinland, and was a successfully attempt as he seized control from the board that did already have control.

It seems that the turmoil was not fully under control, as Weinland had to set up yet another new PO box address in Toledo, replacing another recent PO box address in Toledo which had replaced a Temperance, Michigan PO box. In his February 14th letter, Ron claimed the church was reorganizing under that as a full name. While “The Church of God – PKG” was incorporated in New Jersey on February 11, 2000, the legal entity “the Church of God Inc” continues to this day with an address at the same Cincinnati PO Box address as Weinland’s church. There is also a tax exemption registration in effect for “The Church of God, Inc” but not a similar one for “The Church of God — PKG, Inc”. So it seems that “Church of God — PKG” remains as a “doing business as” name.

In this letter, Ron states that the corporation will be reorganized with no members, not even the board. I wonder if this is the actual case. I am not a lawyer, but as I understand it a corporation is a legal entity which must maintain a relationship to actual people. In the case of a for-profit corporation, this is done by ownership of shares. In the case of a non-profit corporation, this is done by membership. So I doubt that the Church of God Inc. is a corporation with zero members, nor could it be a stock corporation as a non-profit.

Ron’s spiritual idol, Herbert Armstrong, set up a separate corporation during the 1979 receivership crisis of WCG. This new corporation was a “corporation sole” with Herbert Armstrong as its only member. I highly suspect this is how the Church of God Inc. was reorganized, with Ronald Weinland as the corporation sole. In which case the Church equals Ron both financially and ecclesiastically in perhaps we should instead call it “The Church of Ron — Prophet Keeping the Gold”.