I was surfing the web and found this fantastic, non-biased cult website on distructive, doomsday cults, new religions, and harmful religions and denominations.

Upon reading some of the material, I found the information gathered on Calvary Chapel.

I personally have gone there three times, invited by college friends. I found a lot of what happened to be very similar to exacting to what was said in the Calvary Chapel section of this website.

For example, the entire congregation has a sheep-like mentality; when the pastor speaks, everyone agrees; slowly nodding their heads. The friend who told me about Calvary Chapel even writes down [b:659a26b918]notes in a notebook[/b:659a26b918] which is [b:659a26b918]thick[/b:659a26b918] with countless notations and commentaries. There is a heavy emphasis on the Holy Spirit, and, of course, the entire "Buddy Jesus" and "Not-Religion-But-Relationship" theme as well.

It really scares me that my friends may be a part of a harmful religious denomination! Can anyone give me advice? I've invited them to join me to the Episcopal Church where I usually go to both at home and (now) college, but it seems as if she is unwilling! She's a very strong, fundamental Christian, which I have no problem with, but it seems as if she is letting her emotions get in the way of really seeing what is going on.

In addition, when I went to Calvary Chapel, I noticed that the pastors have [b:659a26b918]absolutely no clue[/b:659a26b918] on the Scriptures. It seems that they'll take any Joe-Shmoe who claims to have the Spirit and make him a pastor! For example, the last time (and VERY last time I'll ever go) I went to Calvary Chapel, the sermon used Levitical cleanliness laws and how they applied to life and Jesus. The pastor, to my amazement, couldn't tell the difference between being ritually unclean and having done a sin! (There are, of course, two different words in Hebrew used). Just because of that, all his other allusions to other parts of the Bible and his entire sermon made no sense and! Jesus didn't die for ritual uncleanliness but for sin! The pastor also confused Abraham and Isaac and God and Jesus when it came to the sacrifice; God never killed Jesus...Jesus allowed Himself to be sacrificed! Isaac had no choice! Yes, God is a major part in both, but in one, it is a willing sacrifice that is done (Jesus) and an unwilling sacrifice that is halted by God (Isaac). The way the pastor presented his sermon made him sound like he didn't have a clue, yet the "sheep" just bought it up; no questions asked! Even when I did discussed the problem with one of my friends, he simply shrugged and basically said "that's not the point." How is being a pastor and being ignorant of the Bible NOT the point?

My question is this: is it true that pastors for Calvary Chapel do NOT need a formal education in Christian theology to become pastors? I also read once that such education is even frowned upon! If anyone can shed some light for me as well as give me some advice, I'd appreciate it greatly!

Sorry for the long post.

-Eclectic

Dear Eclectic

I think you are on the wrong track with regard to Calvary Chapel. Over the last 3 years I have had some interesting experiences:

I destroyed a real Christian cult, The Assembly of George Geftakys. The Rick Ross website was intrumental in this, as was a website that I ran, Geftakysassembly.com.

I also attend a Calvary Chapel. I am extremely sensitive to legalism and "cultishness," and have not found a trace of it at the several Calvary Chapels I have visited, nor any at the organizational level.

However, with over 900 churches, I have no doubt that there could be some wierd ones out there. Perhaps the one you have attended is one of the "strange" ones, however to indict the entire Calvary Chapel movement as a "harmful religious denomination," is not warranted.

Perhaps the church your friend attends is off, or perhaps the combination of your friend and the church is not healthy, but to indict an entire denomination is going a bit too far.

Interestingly, this is exactly what the cults do. They meet a person from a Baptist background who is homosexual, and then tell their sheeple, "The Baptists are worldly. Many of them are homosexual." This is stupid.

Your friends church may be off, but I assure you that the Calvary Chapel movement as a whole is not harmful. Any organization of that size is going to have pastors with problems, serious problems. The question is how they deal with it when it comes to their attention. Calvary does the right thing, in my very informed and very critical opinion.

I do not deny that there may be dangerous "cult-like" churches calling themselves Calvary Chapels, but they are quite the exception, and have strayed a long way from the ideals that Calvary stands for.

Brent

Not that I intend to hi-jack this topic but I must ask. How does one destroy a cult?

Quite easily actually.
Telling the truth, out loud, in spite of the opposition a person faces from the cult members usually does the job.

It isn't fun, and it is costly, but if the cognitive dissonance gets loud enough, the cult will make a concession or two. Once they do, it's all over. Most people don't want to do this however, they would rather walk away and "heal."

I found it to be wonderfully healing to tell the truth and watch it make a difference.

Brent

any protestant church can have good or bad leadership.the body which makes up the church are responsible for choosing Godly men to pastor them.with that said i have been to great calvary churches and a couple i would not go back to.you have either true gospel sharing pastors or you have hirelings/preachers who dont care for the flock.its our duty as followers of Christ to pick accordingly.as the church becomes more apostate its getting harder each week to find a GOD fearing/loving pastor.we truly are livng in the last days

jerry sweet:

Meaningful accountability seems to be a problem for Calvary Chapel from Chuck Smith on down. Calvary has a history of problems concerning this issue.

See [www.culteducation.com]

The overwhelming majority of Protestant churches in the United States have democratically elected boards that can fire a postor for bad conduct. That is, churches have constituions and bylaws that provide for the regular election of board members who serve fixed terms and then must stand for re-election. The board typically votes upon and controls the church budget, hiring and firing of staff (e.g. pastors) and is itself elected by secret ballot, as we elect government officials on the local, state and national level.

Calvary also appears to have a probelsm with financial transparency.

Meaningful financial transparency is provided by annually published budgets distributed to all contributors that are independently audited, which disclose in detail all salaries, compensation and expenses paid out from church funds.

No church is perfect and there is "good" and "bad leadership".

But problems concerning leadership can largely be prevented through meaningful accountability.

Democratic church government is one thing that distinguishes Protestant churches from the Roman Catholic Church, which as anyone can see from its recent clergy scandals has a problem with accountability.

Chuck Smith is something like the "pope" of Calvary Chapel. He and his chosen few run the churches much like a franchise operation.

It seems to me that so-called "hirelings" (i.e. pastors that are hired and can be fired) are preferable to dictators without meaningful accountability.