I've seen a thread about Newfrontiers, but I think it's old so I'm making this one instead. Whilst I definitely wouldn't class newfrontiers as a cult, there is something about their organisation that makes me feel uncomfortable. Terry Virgo and the like do look a bit shifty, although they're probably alright. I'm concerned about a friend who is part of one of these churches. She seems to have been brainwashed and some of the things she talks about and does are very out of character. Does anyone have any opinions, knowledge or experience of the newfrontiers group of churches? (it used to be NFI - new frontiers international).

Hi Anon 111, your suspicions are well founded. the church like many has no controls in place and so lends itself to significant abuse potential. I know their was a particular problem with a church of NFI in Essex but have not been able to find specific info. The NF movement seems to take a very literal view of biblical teaching and effectively remove anyone who has the audacity to challenge or question authority. Their male eldership policy is particularly disturbing in the modern era and challenging to women. the leaders in some cases seem to perceive that they are on a higher plain and must not be sullied by any member who cannot quite live up to their expectation. Those expectations will determine if and when you can have boy or girl friends and many other aspects of "normal" living. Your perception of them as being a shady bunch is remarkably intuitive. When I tried to make contact with Terry Virgo in order to report worries about an abusive church there was a remarkable lack of encouragement to the point of indifference. When members are "forced" to leave thro whatever minor indiscretion the pastor perceives, they are often made to feel very small and then become isolated from their spirituality. In one case a pastor tried to insist the individual had to let any other church know if they wanted to join and in another, thetotally unqualified pastor took on counselling of a teenager, trying to force them to leave the family home as a family member was being asked to leave the church. Always worth investigating the finances of NF churches. The Charities Commission website can be useful in this regard. I have a number of other case histories now so if you come across any more, kindly post them. If you are aware of anyone who has been challenged and needs help then I am always pleased to try and assist. Good wishes Chris Jones

Hi Chris and thanks for your reply. I've looked in to this further (partly thanks to an Alpha Course which I couldn't finish) and although I don't want to speak for the entire organisation I do find this particular church worrying.

A few of the problems that I've witnessed are:

1. The leader of this particular church exerts (in my opinion) far too much control over the members' personal lives. Everything my friend does seems to be monitored and it has to be 'approved'. I'm always amazed when I hear about how much the church needs to know about this person's personal life - it's definitely not healthy.

2. If I try to present an alternative perspective on an issue to do with the church's teachings she gets very defensive which, again, is out of character. There is no room for disagreement on any of the teachings. You said they take a literal view of the bible but I've actually found that they take a very open view of the bible's teachings and can therefore change their opinions on things quite quickly. They are very good at evading direct questioning.

3. They place much emphasis on miracles, prophecy, healing and the holy spirit. I don't know how I feel about this. Perhaps it isn't all bad, but it detracts from the purpose of being in church; surely the worship should be focused on God as opposed to his 'gifts'.

4. There seems to be more gloss than substance.

5. There is a strong sense of community which is a great thing, but the people from the church hardly mix with people outside of the church. For example, the young people in the youth groups - despite attending different schools - spend more time with their friends from church than they do with anyone else. It's just slightly claustrophobic, as though everyone knows everyone else's business. I'd imagine it would be hard to leave somewhere like this.

6. There is nothing wrong with being strongly religious but in this case I've seen it get a bit too...extreme. A lot of the members I've spoken to are practically hysterical about their beliefs. It's difficult to explain how this is a problem. I think it's one of those things that you'd have to see for yourself.

7. Ah yes, the views on women are quite frightening. Despite what they claim, they do send out a message to women that they are inferior. There seems to be a lot of pressure to be demure, ultra-feminine and subservient. I've also noticed a pressure on all members to conform.

My friend is a good person and is skilled at many things, but the church does nothing to support this. Instead of encouraging talents, they've been highly critical and they undermine any potential for leadership that this person has. It's awful to watch someone who could be so successful have all of their self-belief and ambition eroded. What's even sadder is I don't think she even notices it's happening. Now there's nothing wrong with having family values etc, but this person wanted to do great things and have a career; now she says she can't have a career and should only have a family because that is supposedly the role God has given her. There have been lots of other things like this but this post is already too long so I'll stop...

One last thing - when you said you have other case histories, what do you mean exactly?

Thank you if you manage to read all of this. Unfortunately, it has turned into a bit of a rant.

Hi, Your observations are the same as my own. There is another thread starting and another member has logged a very useful entry about NF with a written account of their views that I was not aware. If permitted i have copied the excellent commentary, and other links and my response.

The introspective nature of the NF churches I know is extra-ordinary. The near banning of mixing with others is particularly alarming. One of the case histories I have involves members of an NF church whose daughter was seen by a third party talking to a boy from another community in their local town centre. She was duly "reported". Pastor called parents to task at meeting and threatened them to get the daughter under control. They were aghast at the attack and fortunately were not so indoctrinated that they obeyed and were effctively disenfranchised / encouraged to leave under a cloud. With the finger of suspicious pointed at them.

What to do about your friend. First is the friendship worth your stress? The friendship is clearly one way as they do not seem to have respect for your concern. If the friendship is important to you then, why not encourage her to read this web site and see that there are other people who share concern over controlling leadership. NF certainly do not believe in Servant Leadership. Their rules as you see are based on denying the right to complain with an absolute need for a minimum of people able to lodge a complaint against a pastor or elder as they are appointed by God. With the isolation of individuals as I have now found out this is almost impossible to achieve. People are in effect hounded out, and any others almost terrified they will lose salvation by maintaining contact or being supportive. It is one thing losing your church and community but another if you are losing salvation and told you should not join another church. Great emotional distress follows and of course these people are deeply God fearing and feel stigmatised.

Why not explore her feelings about the religious role of women and whether a lesser spiritual function is what she truly believes. Also explore why all the healings, wonders, miracles always seem to happen yesterday or tomorrow but not today when all could attest. Of course nobody can question internally for reasons given above. Perhaps be genuinely interested through your reading and ask if their is any validation. A good question reflects why God concentrates on helping bad necks, backs and headaches but seems to ignore malignant disease etc

Anyway I will see if I can copy the other thread the text reference will give great insight as to the position of this organisation.

I was involved with Newfrontiers (NFI as it was then) for 2 years from 1996 to 1998 and agree with much of the above. Leaders within the organisation pick out a few select passages from the new testament and then regard these as a literal blueprint for how they should organise themselves. I had no experience of any religion before NF, and after realising what they were like I wondered initially whether my experience was a one-off or a peculiar feature of the local group that I was attending. I have since visited 3 other NF groups out of curiosity and found similar views expressed in all of them.

The main problems that I found were that the organisation doesn't tolerate much disagreement, and in common with other evangelical churches the new testament is regarded as the final authority on what everybody ought to believe and on how everybody ought to behave. Anybody who dissents or disagrees significantly with the party line is not welcome. Belief in the God-given authority of their leaders (men only) and belief in dark spiritual forces at work in the rest of society feature a lot in the theology of the organisation, both of which perhaps explain their attitude towards dissent. I believe that there is a tendency for members of the organisation to equate its own aims and objectives with God's aims and objectives, and therefore any criticism of them is regarded as opposition to God.

Their website has quite a few talks and papers that are very informative about where the organisation stands:

Attitude to scripture:
[www.newfrontiers.xtn.org]

Attitude towards authority:
[www.newfrontiers.xtn.org]

Talk on spiritual warfare (from an NF church website):
[jubilee-church.org]

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April 27, 2009 09:23PMchrisjones
Date Added: 09/17/2007
Posts: 6 Re: New Frontiers church groupHi Thanks for your input and I am sure Sarah-Jane will reflect on our commentary. I had come to exactly the same conclusion as yourself with regard to the way they perceive their actions and that of God are the same. Hence they are always right and everyone else is wrong. This sits at the heart of a narcissistic personality disorder in an individual. It is even more concerning when it sits at the core of institutional existence. My further experience is the inability to question anything and the total belief in the Apostolic Ministry of Men as you have so kindly found in the attached web site to your note. What NF just cannot see is that there preachings are prejudicial and prejudice against women is prejudice in the UK as much as it is in other parts of the world although obviously not at the same level as say Afghanistan. My advice to any normal human being who loves God, and cares for fellow humanity is to avoid this group of self deluded fideists and find a "Church" that truly cares about people as a whole and all its members however challenged and challenging they may be. NF may preach love but it is conditional love on their terms and not the biblical love that is so obvious to anyone with a mind to read and understand.

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Hello. I used to be a full-time pastor with a large church which was part of NF for seven years and involved for longer, from 1993 onwards. I left in 2004 in the wake of spiritual abuse which was easily the worst experience of my life.

I maintain a website relating my experience and supplying a number of other links.

The first part of the site deals with my story and could probably do with a re-write. It can be found here.

I have written a short summary of what I see as the structural problems with NF which can be found on the site here.

An overview of the information via the Charity Commission website from a few years ago is also available on my site here although some of the older links are broken.

Most of this reflects much of what has been said above, especially by Chris Jones.

The thing I find most maddening is that the organisation has such a good standing in the evangelical community at large in the UK such that people don't dare blow the whistle.

Hi Eutychus, Sorry to hear of your problems. It seems NF are able to isolate people so that they feel diminished and then not able to even put over a view let alone defend themselves. As long as one is subservient and unquestioning there will be no difficulties for members. The offer of a higher spriritual plane must be alluring to most, and further cemented by the encouragement to tithe. There is no doubt NF are effective at fund raising, so they can certainly talk the talk.

The financial links are most interesting. Numerous trusts, large income and sums distributed to the churches of senior members of the church hierarchy does not seem wise or that transparent as to why payments made. In one example of NFI "justice"a pastor with right wing views who has ejected a number of members amidst much misery, was on the church web site described as being a full time employee but then drawing £38000 in fees on a self employed basis so that he no doubt claimed, tax relief on home, wife as secretary and the education allowance for children (means tested). This illegal act was quite acceptable and not a sin in their eyes.

Given what I have now read I can see that unless numerous people complained then no investigation would take place.This is unlikely to happen as those who might complain are Gosd fearing in my experience and cannot perceive that once they have been asked to leave it can be abything other than their fault. They hang their heads and walk away, often surviving in a spiritual wilderness for years. This group are not financially naive and there does seem a pattern of abuse is emerging. Also the use of the "triangle" to administer summary judgement via a third party is a technique described to me by another disenfranchised former NF member.

Where next for you? Did you find solace? There will be more spiritual casualties. I only wish churches were regulated like other public organisations! regards CJ

Terry used to be fond of saying "New Frontiers is nothing" but that is somewhat disingenuous!

I think it is not unusual for large organisations to have a number of trusts etc and possibly not that unusual for them to have a limited company. I'm not enough of a lawyer to know about it all.

What I am sure of is that 99% of NF church members have no idea that there is such a well-run business structure in operation and what I find sinister is that some of the key people, eg the other members of the board of directors of New Frontiers International Limited, are people who will be completely unheard-of.

I am not convinced that NF is into personal gain in the way some cults are. I have stayed in Terry's house and while it's a lot bigger than mine, I certainly wouldn't have said it was luxurious or that his salary was excessive compared to people in similar positions of responsibility. However I do think that the lack of financial transparency could become a snare. In addition, I think NF has very much a middle class ethos. This may have changed since my day but people definitely looked down on operations without resources fuelled by 10% of a middle or senior management salary.

Similarly, I don't expect that most NF church members realise that their church property is in effect controlled by NF: the apostles appoint the elders who appoint the local church trustees who manage the infrastructure. That's not a problem until the moment there is a division in the church, at which point my guess is that NF or at least their supporters will walk away with the assets.

As to where next for me, I am on the leadership of a church which is basically a remnant of the disaster which overtook us and which functions more or less on a day-to-day basis. A far cry from our former setup in every respect. I have set up my own business, which takes up most of my time, and am not supported in any way by the church. In some ways I have come to terms with what happened and am glad to no longer be a part of the system. Making things make sense spiritually now is a major problem though. I frankly admit work is escapist therapy in many respects.

I get perhaps half a dozen e-mails a year from people who have found my site by Googling and often with a very similar story to tell. I attempt to address structural rather than theological and personal issues in what I see as being wrong with NF. They are mostly relieved to find out they were not the only one.

I was a member of a church in the north west of england which became part of the NF organisation for many years.I did become uncomfortable with the style of leadership and over time left to join a more traditional local church.I still had many friends who chose to stay. One friend in particular over time fell on hard times and his marriage broke up .Without going into too much detail in short It became clear to anyone looking in from the outside that he was being shunned and ostrcised by members of the congregation .The whole situation ended as bad as it could have and my friend 'R' chose to end his life.At the inquest the church leader was asked to answer some questions regarding the behaviour of the church leadership.The week before my friend died he had approached the church leaders in a desperate state to ask if he coud return to church.The answer was a flat 'No'.In their words they said "it would be like a child killer being allowed to sit in the same room as the bereaved parent".At the inquest many incidents came to light regarding the treatment of my friend by members of this particular church inparticular R's desperate attempts to reconcile himself with the church family he had been part of for many years.At the Inquest the church were represented by a barrister.Obviously this is only one persons perspective and I would not wish to say that all NF churches are behaving this way..However I believe that these churches are intimate to the point of addiction.Loyalty and confidentiality are demanded and once you are out you are out.And leaving a church like this is like suffering a bereavmant.The impact on someone asked to leave should not be under estimated.They are not for the faint hearted and I would not recommend Newfrountiers churches at all when there are other churches available.

I was a member of 4 New Frontiers churches for 15 years one of which I was a leader in for 7 years.

I should say that i met many good leaders and had positive experiences in.

However i wish to raise severak points of concern.

I believe New Frontiers like many other Church demoniations is to focused on reputation managenent and as such has allowed leaders to continue to serve when there behaviour has fallen well below that you would expect of a church leader.

I have also seen coersive control used on a regular basis as a way of undermining members and exherting authority. Controlling leadership is common place in many quarters. In some cases these leaders have been moved around from church to church if thr issue becomes to troublesome. There are also patterns particularly with certain apostles of churching leaderships due to over interference.

Pay to play approach exists I am aware of people who were excluded from leadership because they dont tithe or dont tithe enough.

The Apostles do interfere with the autonomy of the local church, acting more like regional directors.

Trustees are often appointed not because they will safeguard but because they are ammenable to leaders and apostles demands.

I would also say for any women aspiring to leadership...steer clear of New Frontiers
..you will not be affirmed in a calling you may even be seen as a trouble maker.

I still have friends and family in New Frontiers my view reflect what they tell me and though i left over a decade ago little aeems to have changed.