Exposing Christian Propaganda for What It Is

sent in by Timotheus
email: elpoeta at dmailman dot com


During my time as a fundamentalist inerrantist christian, I subscribed to various apologetic newsletters, most of which I still continue to receive. Prior to the beginning of my journey to deconversion, I greatly enjoyed reading this material, and eagerly anticipated receiving and devouring each issue for the purpose of defending the faith. These collections of propaganda I have amassed include news journals from Koinonia House Ministries (Chuck Missler), Answers in Genesis (Ken Ham), Times Square Church Pulpit Series newsletters (David Wilkerson), and Harvest Ministries (Greg Laurie), to name a few.

At the time, I was unaware of any criticism of the ideas expressed in these mailings, and had no reason to doubt the truthfulness and accuracy of them. I truly believed that the holy spirit was working through these men to help equip christians to "be prepared to give an answer for the hope you have...." (1 peter 3:15) and "contend for the faith" (Jude 3).

As my research of christianity went deeper and deeper, I began to encounter huge problems (discrepancies, contradictions, absurdities, contrivances, widespread ambiguity, scientific impossibilities, and serious intellectual dishonesty). This, coupled with the wide range of differing beliefs I was seeing among supposed "spirit-filled" christians, marked the early stage of my downward spiral into disbelief.

Over time, after my repeated attempts to justify, rationalize, and harmonize the problems using all available resources (apologetic author's "solutions", commentaries, meetings with church elders, etc.) failed, I reluctantly began to seek answers from critical sources. At this point, I just wanted to get to the truth, so getting both sides of the issue seemed logical, even though I was warned to stick to christian writings. During this time, I was continually stressed mentally from the guilt that resulted from my disbelief, because we charismatic christians were warned continually from the pulpit that satan was always waiting to pounce on us, eager to take away our salvation, and that this type of doubting was one sure way to give him a firm foothold in our spiritual lives. Needless to say, it was hard to get any good sleep during this time. I often stayed up very late almost every night for months doing research.

This was an important crossroad in my life, for on one hand, my tireless quest for truth was clearly leading me away from christian beliefs, while at the same time I was still desperately looking for something...ANYTHING.... to replenish my crumbling faith, in which I had invested virtually everything.

Finally, after many months of serious analysis and with much reluctance, I allowed the tremendous weight of rational, logical thought and true biblical scholarship to come crashing down on my faith, and I deconverted. I could not, and would not allow myself to base my entire life on such a flimsy, uncertain and dishonest foundation.

Now I see christian apologetic writings as pure propoganda. I now can pick apart all of them and expose the deceit, useless circular reasoning and lack of honesty.

I have decided to do this on a regular basis. The following is a brief examination of one of the biggest manufacturers of christian propaganda today: Chuck Missler and Koinonia House Ministries.

Background

The following biography of Chuck Missler was taken from khouse.org , his ministry's own website.

Chuck and Nancy Missler (wife) were both raised in Southern California.

Chuck demonstrated an aptitude for technical interests as a youth. He became a ham radio operator at age nine and started piloting airplanes as a teenager. While still in high school, Chuck built a digital computer in the family garage.

His plans to pursue a doctorate in electrical engineering at Stanford University were interrupted when he received a Congressional appointment to the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis. Graduating with honors, Chuck took his commission in the Air Force. After completing flight training, he met and married Nancy. Chuck joined the Missile Program and eventually became Branch Chief of the Department of Guided Missiles.

Chuck made the transition from the military to the private sector when he became a systems engineer with TRW, a large aerospace firm. He then went on to serve as a senior analyst with a non-profit think tank where he conducted projects for the intelligence community and the Department of Defense. During that time, Chuck earned a master's degree in engineering at UCLA, supplementing previous graduate work in applied mathematics, advanced statistics and information sciences.

Recruited into senior management at the Ford Motor Company in Dearborn, Michigan, Chuck established the first international computer network in 1966. He left Ford to start his own company, a computer network firm that was subsequently acquired by Automatic Data Processing (listed on the New York Stock Exchange) to become its Network Services Division.

Returning to California, Chuck found himself consulting, organizing corporate development deals, serving on the board of directors at several firms, and specializing in the rescuing of financially troubled technology companies. He brought several companies out of Chapter 11 and into profitable operation. Chuck thrived on this type of work.

As Chuck notes, his day of reckoning came several years ago when -- as the result of a merger -- he found himself the chairman and a major shareholder of a small, publicly owned development company known as Phoenix Group International. The firm established an $8 billion joint venture with the Soviet Union to supply personal computers to their 143,000 schools. Due to several unforeseen circumstances, the venture failed. The Misslers lost everything, including their home, automobiles and insurance.

It was during this difficult time that Chuck turned to God and the Bible. As a child he developed an intense interest in the Bible; studying it became a favorite pastime. In the 1970s, while still in the corporate world, Chuck began leading weekly Bible studies at the 30,000-member Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa, in California. He and Nancy established Koinonia House in 1973.

Chuck had enjoyed a longtime, personal relationship with Hal Lindsey, who upon hearing of Chuck's professional misfortune, convinced him that he could easily succeed as an independent author and speaker. Over the years, Chuck had developed a loyal following. (Through Doug Wetmore, head of the tape ministry of Firefighters for Christ, Chuck learned that over 7 million copies of his taped Bible studies were scattered throughout the world.) Koinonia House then became Chuck's full-time profession.

Nancy Missler attended UCLA where she studied art. She met Chuck on a blind date in 1956 and they married the following year. Through Christian author and speaker Henrietta Mears, Nancy became a Christian, and she devoted herself to her family, raising the Misslers' four children, Chip, Mark, Lisa and Michelle.. Nancy also established a company, Missler Aerial Photography Service, that specialized in aerial and architectural photography.

After almost 20 years of marriage they appeared on the outside to have it all: challenging careers, beautiful home and many of the trappings of an extremely successful lifestyle. Despite their strong commitment to Christ, their marriage was falling apart. Nothing seemed to work and they appeared destined for divorce.

But, before such a drastic action, Nancy began to search the Scriptures for the answers to her broken heart. As she started practicing what the Lord revealed, a sequence of events began that revolutionized their marriage! Her studies have continued over 20 years as the Lord has revealed hundreds of Scriptures to guide and direct her steps.

Her first book, Why Should I be The First To Change? describes the miracle of her healed marriage. She followed this with The King's High Way Trilogy: The Way of Agape, Be Ye Transformed and Faith in the Night Seasons. These are study courses that teach the practical application of how to love as God desires; how to renew our minds so we can be transformed into His image; and, how to experience unshakeable faith so we can enjoy intimacy with Him.

More than 400,000 copies of Nancy's books have been sold to date. She has spoken to women's groups throughout the United States as well as Europe, Australia, Israel, Thailand and New Zealand. She has appeared many times on national television and given hundreds of radio interviews.

Nancy and Chuck now travel and teach through their ministry, Koinonia House, and they remain dedicated to create, develop and distribute materials which stimulate, encourage and facilitate serious study of the Bible as the inerrant Word of God.

Missler has a seemingly impressive background.

Missler's Beliefs

The following is a small sampling of ridiculous biblical theories put forth or endorsed by Missler and his ministry over the years. Many of these have been debunked and some are no longer promoted by Missler.

1. He thought the face on Mars indicated that there are Martians who are planning an attack on earth via the moon which would signal the start of the Tribulation. It has been a number of years since he has said this.

2. He thinks that once Mars was so close to earth that you could see its two moons. The proof offered was that Jonathan Swift in his famous book, Gulliver's Travels (1726), describes Mars as having two small moons, way before these two moons were discovered in 1877 by Asaph Hall. He explains this by saying that Mars in ancient times was very close to the earth so man could see these two moons. Then Jupiter ejected a comet (now the planet Venus) which passed close to earth, causing the plagues of Egypt, and parting the Red Sea for Moses. Centuries later Venus jolted Mars into its present orbit. This theory is a delusional fantasy that is devoid of facts.

3.He believes the Bible is one single, harmonious, unified, inspired book, and every detail, every word, every letter, was put there by the authorship of the holy spirit for a reason. He believes this regardless of the well- supported fact that the bible is mostly pseudographical, and has been edited, revised, and embellished many times over.

4. He considers the war in Iraq a prelude to the establishment of the Antichrist’s kingdom on earth, as foretold in the Book of Revelations. He believed and promoted the same type of scenario in regard to the potential nuclear exchange between the U.S. and the Soviet Union In the 1980's.

5. He was among the group of doomsday quacks that believed and preached that the Y2K glitch would usher in the "end times".

Missler has many, many other wild theories and claims he has concocted and supported over the years. His website is www.khouse.org.


Now, on to the Koinonia House news journal...........


This is a monthly "journal" newsletter that is nothing more than a propaganda/profiteering venture. The first part of this booklet-style piece is the propaganda. There is an abundance of rationalization of skeptical questioning, circular reasoning, question-begging, and wild unsupported theories that attempt to discredit biblical criticism on all points.

In the most recent issue, vol. 15, #5, under "physics update" right in the middle of the cover it reads " WAS EINSTEIN WRONG?" We will see that even though he claims this to be an "update", there is nothing new or updated in the entire article. It is simply an attack on Einstein's theory of relativity by creation "scientists" seeking to corroborate science and the bible by any means necessary. In the article, Dr. Michael Murphy, who studied light from distant quasars, claims that "the findings suggest that there is a more fundamental theory of the way that light and matter interact; and that special relativity, at it's foundation, is actually wrong." The originator of this theory is Barry Setterfield, who in 1981 first examined this as a possibility, and was rejected by the vast majority of the scientific community. Even the Institute for Creation Research (ICR) has long ago rejected this hypothesis as ridiculous. So Murphy's remanufacturing of the issue here is beating a dead horse.

This article is an obvious attempt at resurrecting this debunked and widely rejected theory as fact to it's under-educated readers who will blindly accept whatever apologists like Missler say. At the end of the article, Missler's true intentions can be uncovered by this transparent attempt at a disclaimer. He says "Needless to say, this view is highly controversial and THE MAJORITY OF PHYSICISTS HAVE REJECTED SETTERFIELD'S HYPOTHESIS. However, IF such a theory were EVENTUALLY proven correct, it would dramatically alter our concepts of the physical universe. And the REMARKS of Dr. Michael Murphy last month MAY be another small step in that direction."(emphasis mine)

So you see, Missler is using a high degree of smoke and mirrors here. What a shame. So, the lay christian reader is left with the unmistakable impression that this long rejected theory is valid and will soon be proven true by creation scientists. This type of outright deception is deplorable.

The second half of the Missler "news journal" is an obsessive devotional ranting on "private prayer and worship" by Nancy Missler. It is simply a big jug of strange "christian cool-aid".

In one excerpt she says "Just as the perfume of incense and the cloud of glory intermingled and became one above the Golden Altar of incense in the Temple of Solomon, when we worship the lord we become united in love and one in spirit with him. At that moment we can ask whatever we will and the lord promises to hear us. We haven't just verbally attached "in his name" to our prayers, we are literally joined and united "in his name" while we are praying! " Ughhhh......I used to buy into this kind of jesus-obsession mindset. Missler's wife has been discredited as an heretic by many conservative christian groups for her un-scriptural promotion of biblical psychology. For more information on this, go to http://www.psychoheresy-aware.org/nmissler.html

The last pages consist of a catalog of apologetic tapes, videos, DVD's and instructional materials for sale at unbelievably high prices, ranging from $15 to over $100 each.

They must be making a fortune fleecing the flock.

They also started Koinonia Institute, which claims to offer both undergraduate and graduate correspondence course credit in christian studies for degrees up to and including Ph.D. This is the same type of "college" that Kent Hovind supposedly received his Ph.D. from (for the real low-down on Kent Hovind's "credentials", see http://home.austarnet.com.au/stear/bartelt_dissertation_on_hovind_thesis.htm )

In conclusion, this is another example that proves fundamentalists will use any means necessary to keep the dead and bloated whale of creationism and biblical inerrancy afloat. Even in the face of resounding discredit and defeat , those like Missler continue to lie and mislead many good, honest and well-meaning people, enriching their bank accounts and keeping the shackles of false religion firmly in place.

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