In Va., a Powerful and Polarizing Pastor

Rob Foster was 16 when his family unraveled.

He had told his parents that he wanted to leave Calvary Temple, the Pentecostal church in Sterling the family had attended for decades. But church leaders were blunt with his parents: Throw your son out of the house, or you will be excommunicated. And so that December two years ago, Gary and Marsha Foster told Rob that he had to leave. They would not see him or talk to him.

"I was devastated," he said.

For more than three decades, hundreds of families have been coming to Calvary Temple, a sprawling, beige stucco complex that sits unobtrusively behind the suburban strip malls and subdivisions of Leesburg Pike. As conservative Christianity flourished in Loudoun County and across the country in the 1980s, Calvary thrived.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/15/AR2008111502626_pf.html

This one is even more evil than a lot of other religious nutjobs!

The kid had more courage than I did. When I was 15, I told my right wing, fundamentalist parents that I no longer believed - but would respect their faith and continue to attend church with the family. After threats and beatings, I recanted and saw the light and re-dedicated my life "to Christ". For the next few years I faked it, going so far as to serve on missions to Mexico. OTOH, had I continued in my "defiance" I would be dead. It was a very dark and sad chapter in my life.

:eyes:

http://www.finishtherace.org/

medogsbstfrnd wrote:
I know a governor from Alaska the Apostle should get to know. She was hanging with a witch doctor and her pastor is preparing their church for the last days. Kool Aid anyone?

Truly unbelievable. 'Automotive Outreach?' What a scam.

I'm not surprised at him recommending child abandonment though. Doesn't the Sermon On The Mount say for Christ's followers to leave their families behind? It is why I never understood them claiming to be the party of 'family values' based on their christianity.

in that time should be prepared to be separated from their families (due to being ostracized by their families).

It was NOT a command to kick people out of their own families.

Once again, truth gets twisted by twisted individuals like that car idolater in the article.

In fact it states pretty clearly to get things straight with 'your brother,' meaning family I assume. I could go into interpretations, but that is pointless. I digress.

and stupid, but then I never took orders from anyone.

I always said, "Why?"

You go first :D

People sit in a pew for years and listen. If the person doing the preaching is wise that is great. However many use religion to hide their mental illness or warped ideas. If the congregation chooses to follow (like sheep) one of the crazies this is what happens.

"We're not looking to build moral, successful children. We're looking to build Christians."

Damn right you are there, psycho.

That story gives new meaning to Napoleon's famous quotation:

"Religion is what keeps the poor from killing the rich"

with these sprawling little Jonestowns scattered around the country.

As the rest of their lives get worse (bad economy, war, etc.), these people will cling to their one hope: the afterlife. And they will let nothing, not their children, not common sense, stand in the way.

"In 2002, three weeks after the death of his wife, Scott, who was then 55, stood before the congregation and announced that the Bible instructed him as a high priest to take a virgin bride from the faithful. A week later, he did -- a pretty 20-year-old who a couple of years earlier had been a star basketball player on the church high school team."