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The Hyper-Christian, Hyper-Modern Children of God Most Outsiders Who Are Familiar with the Family, Also Called the Children of G

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The Hyper-Christian, Hyper-Modern Children of God Most Outsiders Who Are Familiar with the Family, Also Called the Children of G The Hyper-Christian, Hyper-Modern Children of God Most outsiders who are familiar with The Family, also called The Children of God, would likely consider them Christian fundamentalists, if not some kind of Christian-like cult. Officially known as The Family International (www.thefamilyinternational.org; hereafter COG/FI), the church describes itself as “a Christian community active in over 90 countries, committed to sharing the message of God’s love with others.” Founded in 1960s California, it was originally characterized by communal living and an infamous “law of love” that included sexual sharing and “flirty fishing” (using sexual enticement to lure new recruits). However, as Gordon and Gary Shepherd document, the early movement survived those days and went on to become a “mature movement” with a “support staff” in a “talented and highly effective organizational headquarters unit called World Services” (2010: 11). The Family International challenges many assumptions about fundamentalist groups, with its remarkably modern, even corporate, structure while promoting “a miraculous rather than a naturalistic worldview by emphasizing the permeability of the boundary separating the spirit world from the natural world” (16). The Shepherds justifiably evaluate COG/FI as hyper-theistic and hyper-Christian, but they also describe the organization as hyper-modern, hyper-democratic, and hyper-bureaucratic. For instance, the congregation consists of communal homes around the world, with local leaders or coaches assigned to each home to boost morale and ensure compliance with movement norms. What the group calls “Family discipline Homes” or FD Homes are expected to homeschool their children and sustain a minimum of six adults, 18 years of age or older, living communally, with a maximum membership of 35 people. FD Home members do not earn a living through employment outside of the Family. Rather, they are engaged in full-time evangelizing, humanitarian outreach, and domestic activities with the urban communities in which their Homes are located (11-2). These local homes generate Tithing Reports as well as other documentation, and they also stay in touch with COG/FI Central through a wide array of publications emanating from the center. What the members themselves call World Services, which is COG/FI Central, is the Vatican of the Family (which reminds us just how structured and bureaucratic Catholicism is, too). At the center are the Good News team (which produces the major newsletter), Mama’s Secretaries, the Publications Final Approval Committee, the Family Policy Steering Council, the Church Growth and Outreach Board, the International Board Chairmen, and many departments including their internet department. The group also owns a publishing company, Aurora Productions, licensed in Switzerland (where the legal climate is more in their favor). COG/FI also speaks a corporate-like jargon, featuring terminology like “P&P” (prayer and prophecy), “wine tasting” the prophecies (to make sure they are good), Family Disciple members and Fellow members, FGAs and SGAs (first-generation adults and second-generation adults), Activated Desks (for outreach), and even “get-out” (daily exercise). Part of becoming a member, as in any culture or movement, is learning to master and navigate the language of the group. Especially interesting about COG/FI is its institutional attitude toward and practice of prophecy. Unlike some (but by no means all) Christian sects, prophecy is not closed for the Family. Quite the opposite, COG/FI’s beliefs and programs “emphasize the principle of continuous revelation through direct, personal contact with the spirit world”: Verbatim messages (that Family members call prophecies) are “channeled” from Jesus or, on occasion, other spirit entities, including the departed spirit of David Berg [the group’s founder in the 1960s]. According to the Family, the Good News (or simply GNs) contains “the Word”; that is to say, the Word of God, which, in addition to Bible scripture, most importantly refers to contemporary doctrinal and policy pronouncements attributed to Jesus or his spirit agents through channeled prophecies. The central tasks of the GN Department at World Services include determining which topics should be addressed for publication, obtaining and verifying prophecies that will serve as the basic content for selected topics, and organizing and editing the obtained prophecies into coherent articles for publication (20). In order to accomplish this rather mysterious goal, COG/FI contains a prophecy-committee structure and a prophecy-review process. Maria (Karen Zerby, David Berg’s second wife and the current director of the organization, also known affectionately as “Mama”) “assigns individuals to channel prophecies addressing them and subsequently reviews what is submitted by her staff”: From these preliminary submissions she identifies what she perceives to be the most appropriate for the Family as a whole and then requests specific follow-up prophecies. Maria (or “Mama”) is credited by her staff as having a spiritual gift for asking questions, reviewing and selecting initial prophecies, and asking more clarifying questions in order to obtain “complete” versus “incomplete prophecies.” Complete prophecies, in their final form for publication, are typically the product of numerous contributors (22). Fascinatingly, although prophecies are believed to be “spiritually dictated,” members also believe that God speaks to different individuals in different ways; that human channels of God’s will are imperfect; that individuals’ personalities and personal attitudes always, to some extent, shape or “flavor” channeled messages; that absolute humility and “yieldedness” to God’s will is essential for valid prophetic channeling, and that the degree of yieldedness varies from time to time and person to person; that even those whose “gift of prophecy” is exceptional must struggle with their faith; and that, in fact, God wants his disciples to struggle collectively in coming to a consensus as to the proper interpretations of his Word in resolving questions and problems. Thus, one of the unique characteristics of Family oracular guidance is an institutional commitment to “teamwork prophecies” and, accordingly, one of the major “pitfalls” in producing prophecies, we were told, is losing faith in other Family members’ prophecy channels. It is these beliefs about prophecy—how it is collectively obtained and used—that justify the GN assignment and editing process that has become institutionalized at World Services for publishing God’s Word (23). “What is most important sociologically about Family prophecy, the Shepherds conclude, “is the way that organizational norms have been developed to guide and control prophecy construction so that democratic consensus, rather than division, is the typical outcome” (24). In other words, COG/FI is a group of very modern, democratic, bureaucratic fundamentalists. Reference Shepherd, Gordon and Gary Shepherd. 2010. Talking with the Children of God: Prophecy and Transformation in a Radical Religious Group. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press. .
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