Hi folks! I'm new here. I have had this on my mind lately, about a church I've just moved on from after moving to a different part of the country. It's a question, not a statement, because there were some very good things about that church, churches vary greatly depending on the congregation, and 'cult' is a very strong word.
I'm working on the assumption that a congregation can be considered a cult because of the way it and its members behave - irrespective of denomination. That anything can potentially be a cult.
In my situation it was an Assemblies of God Pentecostal church in a small city. We are in a secular mainland European country with Catholic roots. It was not an English-speaking church. It was very international, and it combined the country's native culture with black and white American and African traditions.
My little niggling concerns are as follows:
1) The people in the church seem to just repeat these little doctrinal catchphrases to each other... it was sometimes hard for a conversation to get beyond them. It is virtually all some of them put on Facebook too. If I did not have friends outside that church on Facebook, my feed would be a barrage of Christian doctrine memes interspersed with family photos. And everyone hits 'like', and virtually nobody dares qualify or oppose anything. Not because anything bad would happen per se. But... just because. Admittedly that happens outside Christian circles too - everyone knows about the Facebook 'echo chamber'. My concern is not that it happens, but that it happens at quite this intensity. It would be the secular/political equivalent of going on Facebook and seeing nothing but pro-Democrat memes and people who agree with them.
The content of real life conversations sometimes just seems to be repeating and reinforcing doctrine too, not even arguing it from Scripture, just the most influential person in the group repeating a doctrine and everyone else nodding and agreeing and giving examples from their lives that 'prove' it. But they shut the conversation down the moment anyone says something to question the unthinking nodding and agreeing. It's not that I disagree with everything they say (although I am not quite doctrinally comfortable within Pentecostalism as a denomination, I must admit, and there are a lot of popular ideas doing the rounds that smack more of Oprah Winfrey than the Bible). I mean, sound doctrine is really important, but doen't life, in all its undefined, un-systematized messiness demand more than just a rote-learned answer? Isn't there more depth to the will of God than as much as you can fit into a Tweet or Facebook shareable? That is virtually all it is with them. Everything is so black and white. The conversations don't feel like 'normal' natural conversations. I sometimes felt like I connected more authentically with non-believers... the hidden pressure for every utterance to be perceived as being in agreement with the pastor, or the pastor's list of recommended authors, was hard to bear.
2) The people go on and on about the importance of prayer and reading the Bible, and their go-to answer whenever there's something not right in your life is 'take it to the Lord in prayer'... you would think that they spent hours praying every day, to offer that advice so unthinkingly, often and unaccompanied by much else. But they discourage the use of Bible commentaries, seemingly. They do not spend much of the cell group actually looking at the Bible text, or teach us how to interpret it. They organise elaborate prayer days with 'prayer stations' and special deco and texts all around the room because they say they cannot pray for an hour without being distracted otherwise! And yet there are beautiful green spaces around the city, and the Cathedral is open every day from early morning until 8pm. Was I the only one who knew about these and used them as prayer spaces?
3) Intelligence seems to be frowned upon. People are told to forget everything they learned at school. I have heard visiting pastors tell everyone to turn their brains off, to stop thinking completely. It is true that the country I'm in is curiously anti-Christian and that much of their Philosophy lessons is essentially arguments against theism and Catholicism in particular... but I am convinced that everything we learn can be used to the glory of God, and that we are to worship him with all our mind, not just all our heart, soul and strength. I am convinced that the ability to think soundly is a gift from God, even if it isn't the idol that the Enlightenment made it into - even if it is just on a par with the ability to sing, or to cultivate tomato plants. It is profitable to witness and life to be able to reflect on doctrine and ask questions - surely?
4) They do not seem to embrace other church denominations, though they do not go as far as to consider them 'unsaved'. But you mention say anything good, or neutral, about the Cathoic church and the air turns to ice. They did not like to hear of me joinjng a different denomination in my new city. There is a sense in which other denominations are not seen as wholly 'Christian' as they are. They criticise the Catholic church (and other 'episcopal' church types) for its reliance on art and reciting texts repetitively and not reading the Bible enough. But they themselves use images in their prayer days and power point projections and repetitive refrains in worship songs that seem to repeat the same line forever (and goodness knows they have enough 'doctrine soundbites' that they keep coming out with). The sermons are rarely directly from the Bible (they are reflections based on it, but not directly about the text itself) and the cell groups are not Bible studies at all. A few lines might be cited, maybe with a comment from the leader, and that's it. I am not a Catholic, but the similarities between some of the worship practices are apparent - it is just the content and the traditions behind them that differ. Why can't they accept that here are some things they share in common with these other churches? Then they could either change to make themselves different if they're bad things, or they could embrace them in the other churches too if they're good things. Church history is a minefield, but the older denominations hold some real treasures, for all their 'errors', just as Pentecostalism holds treasures!
5) When I express something happy that has happened, they will utter a little catchphrase. The problem is not with what they say, but that it is the same every time and like a 'jargon'. Of course, even in non-church contexts people seem to have a limited number of phrases to react to good news - so it is not so much a concern. It is more a concern that when I express a need, or a worry, they do the same. They say 'Oh well, then you should go to your room and close your door and call on the Lord.' The pastor says it too. Again, the problem is not with what they say, but with the fact that it is always the same thing. Isolate yourself with God. Not, 'come to me, have a hug, and let me comfort you with God.'. No, suffering people are told to isolate themselves first, and by 'default'. You tell a kid to go isolate themselves in their room with the door shut as a punishment for being naughty and that is what it feels like. There is no will to connect or acknowledge each other's pain authentically. Whether I was feeling lonely because I am living far away from my family, or my mother was diagnosed with cancer, they would say the same thing. I would have preferred them to say nothing and just hold my hand, or hug me. That is what I was used to doing in my home country.
6) People don't always render service to each other because they are glad to, but sometimes because the pastoral team compels them to. I know when this is the case because I see them counting the cost and inconvenience it has caused to themselves. The difference between compliance and cheerfulness is not always hard to spot.
7) I received a strong verbal condemnation from the pastor's wife for asking for clarification over a matter involving me writing a blank cheque to someone in the church. The person was doing me a favour and I was (of course) paying their expenses. The pastor's wife described whatbI must do to pay the person, and how I must o it, and I could not understand the rationale of doing it that way, so I asked her what was wrong with the plan I had proposed in the first place. She shouted at me down the phone, saying that it was wrong of me to try to understand her instructions as to how and when I ought to write out the blank cheque, and that I should just obey her, since I am subject to the church's charity and would be desperate without it. She told me that my sin was disobedience and lack of trust. The church was helping me, therefore I should obey the church without questioning or seeking to understand, because that is how I ought to obey God.
That's not everything... but it's enough. I am glad to say I am in a different city now and no longer in that church. Could I have your advice? Am I just being picky, or was this an unhealthy situation?
Thank you.
I'm working on the assumption that a congregation can be considered a cult because of the way it and its members behave - irrespective of denomination. That anything can potentially be a cult.
In my situation it was an Assemblies of God Pentecostal church in a small city. We are in a secular mainland European country with Catholic roots. It was not an English-speaking church. It was very international, and it combined the country's native culture with black and white American and African traditions.
My little niggling concerns are as follows:
1) The people in the church seem to just repeat these little doctrinal catchphrases to each other... it was sometimes hard for a conversation to get beyond them. It is virtually all some of them put on Facebook too. If I did not have friends outside that church on Facebook, my feed would be a barrage of Christian doctrine memes interspersed with family photos. And everyone hits 'like', and virtually nobody dares qualify or oppose anything. Not because anything bad would happen per se. But... just because. Admittedly that happens outside Christian circles too - everyone knows about the Facebook 'echo chamber'. My concern is not that it happens, but that it happens at quite this intensity. It would be the secular/political equivalent of going on Facebook and seeing nothing but pro-Democrat memes and people who agree with them.
The content of real life conversations sometimes just seems to be repeating and reinforcing doctrine too, not even arguing it from Scripture, just the most influential person in the group repeating a doctrine and everyone else nodding and agreeing and giving examples from their lives that 'prove' it. But they shut the conversation down the moment anyone says something to question the unthinking nodding and agreeing. It's not that I disagree with everything they say (although I am not quite doctrinally comfortable within Pentecostalism as a denomination, I must admit, and there are a lot of popular ideas doing the rounds that smack more of Oprah Winfrey than the Bible). I mean, sound doctrine is really important, but doen't life, in all its undefined, un-systematized messiness demand more than just a rote-learned answer? Isn't there more depth to the will of God than as much as you can fit into a Tweet or Facebook shareable? That is virtually all it is with them. Everything is so black and white. The conversations don't feel like 'normal' natural conversations. I sometimes felt like I connected more authentically with non-believers... the hidden pressure for every utterance to be perceived as being in agreement with the pastor, or the pastor's list of recommended authors, was hard to bear.
2) The people go on and on about the importance of prayer and reading the Bible, and their go-to answer whenever there's something not right in your life is 'take it to the Lord in prayer'... you would think that they spent hours praying every day, to offer that advice so unthinkingly, often and unaccompanied by much else. But they discourage the use of Bible commentaries, seemingly. They do not spend much of the cell group actually looking at the Bible text, or teach us how to interpret it. They organise elaborate prayer days with 'prayer stations' and special deco and texts all around the room because they say they cannot pray for an hour without being distracted otherwise! And yet there are beautiful green spaces around the city, and the Cathedral is open every day from early morning until 8pm. Was I the only one who knew about these and used them as prayer spaces?
3) Intelligence seems to be frowned upon. People are told to forget everything they learned at school. I have heard visiting pastors tell everyone to turn their brains off, to stop thinking completely. It is true that the country I'm in is curiously anti-Christian and that much of their Philosophy lessons is essentially arguments against theism and Catholicism in particular... but I am convinced that everything we learn can be used to the glory of God, and that we are to worship him with all our mind, not just all our heart, soul and strength. I am convinced that the ability to think soundly is a gift from God, even if it isn't the idol that the Enlightenment made it into - even if it is just on a par with the ability to sing, or to cultivate tomato plants. It is profitable to witness and life to be able to reflect on doctrine and ask questions - surely?
4) They do not seem to embrace other church denominations, though they do not go as far as to consider them 'unsaved'. But you mention say anything good, or neutral, about the Cathoic church and the air turns to ice. They did not like to hear of me joinjng a different denomination in my new city. There is a sense in which other denominations are not seen as wholly 'Christian' as they are. They criticise the Catholic church (and other 'episcopal' church types) for its reliance on art and reciting texts repetitively and not reading the Bible enough. But they themselves use images in their prayer days and power point projections and repetitive refrains in worship songs that seem to repeat the same line forever (and goodness knows they have enough 'doctrine soundbites' that they keep coming out with). The sermons are rarely directly from the Bible (they are reflections based on it, but not directly about the text itself) and the cell groups are not Bible studies at all. A few lines might be cited, maybe with a comment from the leader, and that's it. I am not a Catholic, but the similarities between some of the worship practices are apparent - it is just the content and the traditions behind them that differ. Why can't they accept that here are some things they share in common with these other churches? Then they could either change to make themselves different if they're bad things, or they could embrace them in the other churches too if they're good things. Church history is a minefield, but the older denominations hold some real treasures, for all their 'errors', just as Pentecostalism holds treasures!
5) When I express something happy that has happened, they will utter a little catchphrase. The problem is not with what they say, but that it is the same every time and like a 'jargon'. Of course, even in non-church contexts people seem to have a limited number of phrases to react to good news - so it is not so much a concern. It is more a concern that when I express a need, or a worry, they do the same. They say 'Oh well, then you should go to your room and close your door and call on the Lord.' The pastor says it too. Again, the problem is not with what they say, but with the fact that it is always the same thing. Isolate yourself with God. Not, 'come to me, have a hug, and let me comfort you with God.'. No, suffering people are told to isolate themselves first, and by 'default'. You tell a kid to go isolate themselves in their room with the door shut as a punishment for being naughty and that is what it feels like. There is no will to connect or acknowledge each other's pain authentically. Whether I was feeling lonely because I am living far away from my family, or my mother was diagnosed with cancer, they would say the same thing. I would have preferred them to say nothing and just hold my hand, or hug me. That is what I was used to doing in my home country.
6) People don't always render service to each other because they are glad to, but sometimes because the pastoral team compels them to. I know when this is the case because I see them counting the cost and inconvenience it has caused to themselves. The difference between compliance and cheerfulness is not always hard to spot.
7) I received a strong verbal condemnation from the pastor's wife for asking for clarification over a matter involving me writing a blank cheque to someone in the church. The person was doing me a favour and I was (of course) paying their expenses. The pastor's wife described whatbI must do to pay the person, and how I must o it, and I could not understand the rationale of doing it that way, so I asked her what was wrong with the plan I had proposed in the first place. She shouted at me down the phone, saying that it was wrong of me to try to understand her instructions as to how and when I ought to write out the blank cheque, and that I should just obey her, since I am subject to the church's charity and would be desperate without it. She told me that my sin was disobedience and lack of trust. The church was helping me, therefore I should obey the church without questioning or seeking to understand, because that is how I ought to obey God.
That's not everything... but it's enough. I am glad to say I am in a different city now and no longer in that church. Could I have your advice? Am I just being picky, or was this an unhealthy situation?
Thank you.
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