Response to
Christianity Today
article

Phillip Arnn of Watchman Fellowship, a Christian research and apologetics ministry in Arlington, Texas, wrote the following letter to the editor to Christianity Today after an article about the WCG appeared in the July issue.

 To the Editor,

The July issue of CT printed a brief article by Marshall Allen titled, “Church Sells Armstrong’s Works.” I was quoted in that article, “Phil Arnn of Watchman Fellowship, a Christian research and apologetics ministry, said the deal raises an ethical question about the WCG. ‘These are heretical doctrines that are destructive to the eternal life of anyone who comes under their influence,’ Arnn said. ‘To have profited from the release of the copyrights is a matter that I would think (would be) very troubling to the conscience.’ ”

May I present “the rest of the story?” Any time someone is interviewed for a print article there is the risk of being misquoted or partially quoted. The final decision rests with the reporter. In this case I was partially quoted.

My quote is followed by that of a former minister of the Church. Both quotes suggest that the leadership of the Worldwide Church of God is only interested in the money gained from the sale of the Armstrong material. That certainly was not my thought or my intended meaning.

I have spent time with the men who are in positions of responsibility in the Worldwide Church of God. I respect them for the dedication they have shown in the shepherding of the church during years of constant stress. I personally embrace these men as brothers in Christ and as fellow laborers in the vineyard of Christ.

I do not believe for a moment that the decision to sell the copyrights to Armstrong’s heretical works was taken lightly. I believe that it was a struggle of conscience for these Christian leaders to make such a decision.

The rest of the story that I discussed with Mr. Allen was the lose-lose situation that faced the WCG leadership. There are over one hundred splinter groups that have formed that teach the doctrines of Herbert W. Armstrong. There is no possible way that the WCG could fight all of them to prevent them from pirating the Armstrong materials.

   I acknowledge that I misspoke when I used the word profited in my quoted comment. I believe the Worldwide Church of God most likely only recouped what it had lost in fighting the Philadelphia Church of God in court for six years.

Pastors of large and small churches have to make financial decisions all the time. How much more complicated it must be to make such decisions for a fellowship of churches caring for tens of thousands of God’s people. The rest of the story is that sometimes the decisions we have to make are between bad and worse. The leaders of the WCG are honorable men. We should all pray that God would grant them wisdom and strength.

Phillip Arnn
Watchman Fellowship, Inc.
Arlington, Texas

Response from CT editor

The Christianity Today editor replied:

It is in the very nature of a reporter’s work to exercise selective judgment in choosing quotations for use in a story. In a certain number of cases, however, that may leave the person being quoted feeling that his statements are mis- or under-represented. When that happens, we try to open the magazine’s letters column as an appropriate forum for clarification.

I am passing your letter along to the editor in charge of that department, with the recommendation that he publish a significant portion of the letter at his earliest opportunity. Space constraints mean that he may have to do some editing and condensing as is done with all letters to the editor.

David Neff
Editor
Christianity Today

Inaccurate property value figure

To the Editor:

The sale of the Worldwide Church of God’s Ambassador campus (CT, July) will represent a meaningful and much-need financial gain for the church. As noted in your article, the church is not in a position to estimate that amount at this time.

What we can say is that the church will benefit only from the sale of the land. The $750 million figure you cited as the eventual retail value of all the proposed homes is many fold the amount that the church will realize from the sale of the land. We would not want a misimpression to linger with your readers.

Mathew Morgan,
Secretary of the Board
Worldwide Church of God
Pasadena

Copyright © Worldwide Church of God, 2003