Thursday, February 27, 2020

Gaia Goes to Church

The Revival of an Ancient Pagan Goddess


“...they are mad upon their idols.
(Jeremiah 50:38b)

Gaia goes to Hillsong, Christmas 2019[1]


“Gaia was the Earth goddess of the ancient Greeks....
Now, after thousands of years
of exile to the realm of myth and folklore,
the goddess has reappeared.”
[2]

“We are witnessing the emergence of a new metaphor
for the earth and our relationship to it:
that is, the picture of the planet as a self-organizing,
self-regulating and, to some degree,
a self-conscious entity.
Many refer to that entity as sacred,
and call it by the name of ‘Gaia’,
ancient Greek goddess of the earth.”

~Loren Wilkinson, Themelios, The Gospel Coalition, 1993[3]


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia

By Sarah H. Leslie

A new morality is forming based on an old spirituality. Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders described the environmental crisis as a “moral imperative” during a Democrat Party presidential debate. The recent Amazon Synod of Bishops of the Roman Catholic Church invoked Pachamama, a “Mother Earth” goddess, as Pope Francis considers adding a new sin, an “ecological sin.”[4]

Gaia, an ancient fertility goddess, has provided a spiritual metaphor for climate change since the late 1980s. Climate change is a scientific issue. Climate change has also always been a political issue. The first generation of open advocates for a New World Order seized upon the climate as a perfect crisis to revolutionize the world’s governance systems. So how could masses of population be persuaded to radically transform their lives? An ancient spiritual myth was revived – Gaia. Gaia could function as a generic goddess, adaptable to major world religions as a “metaphor,” a “framing story” that could impel people to sacrifice freedom for a higher purpose — a religious cause — to save Gaia, the earth re-conceived as a sacred deity:

“…climate change is cynically used by a certain section of people to justify their political goals of steering the West away from its way of life, a way they perceive to be evil and harmful, hetero-patriarchal, and capitalist. How? Appealing to the faith-based part of human brains,…”[6]

The earth-mother Gaia is a an ancient fertility goddess, what Scripture calls an “idol,” and her association with mystery religions has not been cloaked since the rise of the New Age Movement.

New Age promoting Gaia, circa 1990.[7]

Gaia's Grand Entry
Gaia has been trying to gain entry into the evangelical church for the past five decades. Gaia has employed a longterm strategy. We are now predicting her inevitable entrance with the rise of the Green New Deal and its mandate to revolutionize society. Gaia has a plan — for both a global spirituality and a new world order governance system. With Pope Francis leading the way for a revivified Gaia, we take note that evangelical scholars have a disturbing history of following his lead. Already there are ominous indications that they are headed that direction.

Several recent noteworthy events in the evangelical world give rise to our concern. This past month it was reported that Cru (formerly Campus Crusade for Christ) at Baylor University (Baptist) had attempted to invite Native American new age occultist, Kaitlin Curtice to preach to the students.” This climate change activist reportedly prayed to “Mother Mystery.”[8]

Wall Street Journal, Nov. 15, 2019[9]


Gaia also recently made a grand entrance through another doorway, this time in one of her related goddess guises, Ishtar,[10] “Queen of Heaven”! Previously Gaia’s images were considered too provocative for a church setting. But Hillsong broke down those barriers in their exotic Christmas 2019 concert.[17] (See exhibit at the top of this post.)

Gaia and her revolutionary religion first tried to gain access to evangelicals in the late 1970s, when a blueprint[13] was developed and a series of consultations on the future were held to promote her attendance. She didn’t fully succeed at that time. The only ones actively welcoming her were academic elites and mainline Protestant denominations. She came in with a “stewardship of the earth” mandate, reframing the early chapters of Genesis into a conservation of the earth’s resources, often barely disguised as Communism/Socialism.[14]

There was a movement to forge theological syntheses with Gaia’s tenets within the rarified air of theological academia. Through this door Gaia tried to come in again again circa 1990, but evangelical church doors mostly remained closed to her — in part due to warnings about the rising occultism of the New Age Movement. Gaia’s followers then attacked those early warning discerners.[15] At the same time there was a rise of the conservative Christian Right, and they weren’t too fond of Gaia’s political objectives. However, that didn’t stop Christianity Today from publishing a laudatory issue on January 11, 1993:



Gaia's Secular Activism
Gaia took on momentum in society circa 1990 and popular books promoted her particular brand of environmental activism. She easily walked through the door of public education, openly invited by education reform proponents. Gaia began inculcating young minds with her earth-centered doctrines. For this secular entryway to work she had to carefully recalibrate her sacred narrative. She presented herself as a “new story” based on the mythology of her origins but recast into a new paradigm for science. Scientific facts running contrary to her narrative had to be denied, deleted or selectively sorted. Young people would become indoctrinated with her new earth-centered morality mindset, a strategy that is beginning to pay off in our current era. The Green New Deal represents the climax of this generational indoctrination. Discerning researcher Berit Kjos covered this Gaia agenda extensively over the course of three decades (see her website: http://www.crossroad.to).

Meanwhile the church was becaming more worldly, slowly coming around to Gaia’s way of thinking. As the church embraced New Age spirituality its sturdy doctrinal foundations became eroded. Other myths and fables were rapidly gaining entrance as spiritual metaphors, so why not include Gaia in the emerging evangelical pantheon? Evangelicals were rapidly undergoing structural, theological and spiritual “transformation.” The literal Genesis account that had been barricading the door to Gaia’s mythical version of creation was faltering. Gaia once again re-crafted her narrative as a peace-filled creation “stewardship of the earth” paradigm.[16] It sounds very utopian. Who could be against stewardship?



Gaia's Global Governance 
Through this moral mandate to save the earth Gaia inevitably exposed her political agenda – a very sinister strategy that is based on implementing an extreme form of dominion over the earth. As such this is Dominionism – but coming from the political Left.[17] You see, Gaia isn’t just a New Age goddess, she is a New World Order icon.[18] This can best be seen in the pivotal book The Gaia Peace Atlas, published in 1990 (Pan Books). Her plan includes extreme measures restricting freedoms, restructuring everyday life, redistributing global wealth, and implementing mandatory population control. Regardless of what one thinks of the climate crisis, the radical solutions proposed by Gaia’s adherents are totalitarian. Previously we wrote about the

emerging structure of global governance transcending the nation-state. The Gaia Peace Atlas (Pan Books, 1988) contains a vivid picture of future governance models on pp 238-9, stating that in the future, “hierarchical, centralized ‘authority’ will give way to a network of interlocking levels of governance.” The title of the book is a reference to James Lovelock’s “Gaia Hypothesis,” in which he refers to the Earth in terms of this Greek goddess, and humanity as both an organism and a deity. The Gaia Peace Atlas claims that “recognizing this truth [about Gaia] is fundamental to peace.” (p. 10) And it vividly portrays a yin/yang symbol embedded within a human skull on page 164-5 [see exhibit], saying that “Tao, or harmony, is established and peace returns” when people replace “discord and dis-ease with harmony and health.” [Dis-ease and health are not defined, ed.][19]

The extent to which Gaia’s morality leaven has infiltrated and permeated the evangelical church world already, especially via her progressive advocacy and “social justice,”[20] is a matter of grave concern. There are Green Dominionists who have already cloaked their agenda in these terms.

It is important to know what she represents. Gaia today is still employing the same formula that worked so effectually for her in the past. Below is a summary of her history and objectives.



Gaia Goes to School
We first encountered Gaia when she went to school in Iowa in 1992 when my friends Marla Quenzer and Karen Kurth attended an education reform conference at which Gaia’s program for indoctrinating school children was launched.[21] The following account is excerpted from a 1992 article by Karen Kurth (see exhibit above) titled “What on Earth is Gaia?”
“…The book Dharma Gaia defines Gaia to be the ancient Greek name for the Goddess of the Earth; the Earth as a sentient being. Sentient is defined as a being or person that has the faculty of perception. When you put this together, it means that the Earth is a living being, capable of making decisions.

“The modern Gaia has become more than a religious or spiritual idea. Gaia is now also the name of an increasingly powerful and influential scientific theory.

“The first time I encountered this aspect of Gaia was at a conference called ‘Iowa to Iowans… Defining World Class Education” during a workshop entitled “Global Education: Reaching for Common Vision” presented by Dr. Cordell Svengalis, an employee of the Iowa Department of Education. His presentation included an overhead slide of “Earth: The Old Story: Conventional Wisdom” and another slide “Earth: The New Story: Transformation.”[22] There appeared on the second slide the word “Gaia.” Here I heard “Gaia” referenced as both an entity and a deity.

“Dr. Svengalis also had in his possession a manual entitled Catalog of Global Education Classroom Activities, Lesson Plans and Resources…. I obtained a copy of it along with A Guide for Integrating Global Education Across the Curriculum from the Iowa Department of Education.” 



Gaia's Mandatory Curriculum
The contents of the Iowa global education curriculum was described in the Herescope post titled “Big Bad Cows and Cars.” This mandate required classroom teachers “integrate and infuse” global education across the entire curriculum – thus ensuring that parents could not “opt out” their children. At this time in Iowa homeschoolers were persecuted so this wasn't an option either.

In order to silence citizen opposition, the Iowa Department of Education garnered support for the project in advance, bringing in major Iowa newspaper media and prominent business community as “stakeholders.” In this way the press was controlled and the financial incentives were put in motion. Those citizens who opposed this measure were branded as a “handful of radical extremists.” This same strategy has been employed in the church world — 1) mix up Gaia’s religion with Christianity, 2) engage prominent church leaders, scholars and media to sign on to the synthesis, and 3) denigrate any opposition.

Gaia came into schools via a curriculum, but the suggested resources indicated a more radical New World Order governance agenda. Karen noted:

“Listed in the Bibliography of this Guide was a book called The Gaia Peace Atlas. It was recommended as an excellent source of general background information. The Gaia Peace Atlas calls us the people of Gaia and contains James Lovelock’s definition of Gaia. Several more references occurred in the original versions of these Department of Education documents, including classroom activities for children that utilized James Lovelock’s pseudo-scientific, religious ‘Gaia Hypothesis’. Who is James Lovelock, and what is this curious Gaia Hypothesis?” 
 
James Lovelock with his Gaia statue[23]

Gaia & Lovelock
Karen recounts that Lovelock was “an independent scientist” and a professor. He had notable credentials, including he was “Fellow of the Royal Society” and had “worked on the NASA Space Program.” Significantly, he was “a Fellow of the Lindisfarne Association, which is a New Age group headquartered at St. John the Divine Episcopal Cathedral in New York City.” He had authored books about Gaia “as well as numerous articles for magazine and scientific publications.” Karen records that in the meadow next to his laboratory in England “there looms conspicuously a marble statue of Gaia herself, Greek goddess of the Earth.” Thus, despite his protestations that he was working on a scientific hypothesis, he maintained an actual idol in his backyard. Karen continued:

“James Lovelock is the single person most responsible for Gaia’s current resurgence. Lovelock and Lynn Margulis share the origin of the Gaia Hypothesis which postulates that the physical and chemical condition of the Earth, of the atmosphere and of the oceans has been and is actively made fit and comfortable by the presence of life itself. This is in contrast to the conventional evolutionary dogma which holds that life adapted to the planetary conditions as they evolved their separate ways.

“In Lovelock’s 1972 article, “Gaia As Seen Through the Atmosphere,” he reintroduced the ancient goddess, giving her new meaning as well as life. His article revealed his desire to revive “…the older Earth as a very large living creature, Gaia, several giga-years old, who has molded the surface, the oceans, and their air to suit her and for the very brief time we have been part of her, our needs.” 


Gaia's Pseudo-Science vs. Science
The significance of this shift in perception of the planet would rapidly take over certain segments of the scientific world. It became difficult to distinguish actual factual truth from the rhetoric, spin, hype, misused statistics, frauds, etc. Lovelock's Gaia Hypothesis has always been just that — a hypothesis— and not a matter of scientifically proven fact. As a hypothesis it began as a brazen attempt to integrate spirituality with science. Lovelock asserted that the planet itself was “alive, the largest of living systems.” Karen wrote,

“Lovelock’s new Gaia, now dressed in the fashionable garb of scientific formulation, seeks to again have us believe that our planet Earth is a living creature—as the ancient Greeks believed. It is no longer just a mass of rock, water and air providing a home for billions of individual forms of life. Instead, the planet and all life upon it are to be understood as a single, interconnected whole: a living, breathing, and thinking organism.”

“The idea of a Gaian Mind was central to Lovelock’s original Gaia Hypothesis as presented in his first book, Gaia: A New Look At Life On Earth. Supposedly, Lovelock came to believe in the existence of a “Gaian mind” after many years of intense scientific research. However, the idea bears startling resemblance to the concept of ‘noosphere’ postulated by the de-frocked Jesuit, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, whose writings about the ultimate evolution of man to a higher consciousness have had significant impact on the New Agers.

“The mind of Gaia was the intelligence and consciousness that directed and controlled the entirety of the Earth’s geophysical and biological processes. Dr. Lovelock makes no apologies for what his scientific colleagues consider ‘mystical’, ‘teleological’, and ‘unscientific’ thinking. In the preface to his first book, Lovelock concedes that his theory… ‘like a religious belief, is scientifically untestable and therefore incapable in its own context of further rationalizations.’” 

The unscientific nature of Lovelock’s spiritual hypothesis lent itself perfectly to the rise of postmodern thinking in academia. The mystical New Agers, already steeped in Hinduism and Buddhism, glommed onto Lovelock as an explanation for all planetary woes. Mankind was in crisis which would necessitate radical political and spiritual revolution. Biblical eschatology quite obviously needed to be re-written, compromised, and altered in significant ways to shift evangelicals over to a Gaia-compatible worldview of an impending planetary environmental apocalypse.[24]

Lovelock wrote The Ages of Gaia in 1987, mainly in response to the criticisms of the scientific community at the time. Karen noted,

“From then on, for the Gaia Hypothesis to gain credibility it was necessary to eliminate any implications of purpose or intelligence behind the creation of our planet. Gaia’s guiding intelligence, a prevalent theme in his first book, is replaced by mathematical formulas and computer simulated models. The guiding intelligence formerly ascribed to the Gaian mind was not explicable by purely random and ‘natural’ processes. This new ‘Gaian model’ gained Lovelock and his theory the approval of a larger sector of the scientific community.”

After a major conference of the American Geophysical Union in March of 1988, the new Gaia that emerged was highlighted in an article in Science Magazine (4/22/88) titled “No Longer Willfull, Gaia Becomes Respectable.” Karen reported that “the article concluded that the old Gaia (now called the strong version of the Gaia Hypothesis) is now ‘dead’ and a new and more powerful Gaia has arisen in her stead.”

Note how Gaia reinvented herself by adopting a more sophisticated scientific persona. After this “a flurry of scientific reports grounded in Gaia theory and spurred on by real and supposed environmental crises immediately inundated the scientific literature.”

Exhibit: The Gaia Peace Atlas (Pan, 1990), p. 170

“God and Gaia”
But Gaia couldn’t let things rest there. She had to enter the church. Maintaining a spiritual image was essential. Sensual imagination, visual imagery, mythology and superstition needed to replace biblical doctrine. Karen reported that the last chapter of Lovelock’s book The Ages of Gaia is titled “God and Gaia.” Incredibly, Lovelock “begins by describing his childhood religious experiences which included witches, May trees, views expressed by Quakers and conditioning about the power of the occult.” This sounds quite Wiccan.

Like other Wiccans, “Lovelock believes that orthodox Christianity… is a distortion of the purest form of religious truth. To recover our true spiritual nature, Lovelock believes we need to return to the ancient forms of goddess and Earth spirituality—we must immediately return to the worship of the Earth goddess if we are to save ourselves from destruction.”

Considering the prior opposition of the evangelical church, a significant stumbling block to an acceptance of the Gaia Hypothesis has always been holding to the literal doctrine of Creation as biblical Truth. To this point Karen observed,
“Lovelock’s underlying assumption… is that our world could not have been created through the act of an infinitely intelligent and loving God…. A God who is both creator and sustainer of the Earth is completely foreign to Lovelock’s way of thinking. He rejects the God of the Bible and fills the resulting void with Gaia who then becomes the creative, guiding and healing force behind our world and the cornerstone of our existence.” 

Underscoring Lovelock’s heretical spirituality, in an issue of Orion Nature Quarterly, he ominously stated “Gaia is immortal. She is surely a virgin. She does not need to reproduce herself as she is immortal. She is certainly the mother of us all, including Jesus… Gaia is not a tolerant mother. She is rigid and inflexible, ruthless in the destruction of whoever transgresses. Her unconscious objective is that of maintaining a world adapted to life. If we men hinder this objective we will be eliminated without pity.”

The United Nations advocacy of Gaia.[25]

Gaia: A New World Order Goddess
Already, by 1992, the New Age Movement was “quickly incorporating Gaia worship into its system of spiritual beliefs and practices. The feminist and ecologically-based spiritualities, which include witchcraft, goddess worship, eco-feminism, paganism and other Earth worship groups have all become strong supporters of the mystical, quasi-religious Gaia. Earth spirituality… is quickly becoming equated with Gaia worship.” How could Christianity become integrated with Gaia's morality? Karen wrote that

“James Morton is the Dean of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine and is a member of the New Age group Lindisfarne. He states that ‘Gaia is a great organizing principle for bringing people into religious experience, though perhaps not always to Christianity.’” This is why Gaia needed to start working on changing Christianity, turning it more towards the New Age so that it could more readily incorporate her tenets.

“Morton concludes that ‘the living Earth principle gives us strong images and metaphors that require an inclusive way of understanding, a religious way of comprehending the greater whole. After all, the word “religion” does mean, at its roots, to knit together. Not at all unlike the Gaian idea of global interdependence: environment and organisms knit together as one. In this way Gaia may prove less a set of specific beliefs than a way to reincorporate faith into daily life.’” 

The Pope celebrating Gaia.
Note the Pachamama fertility goddess icon lower left.[26]

Christianity itself needed to be reinvented. It needed to transform itself by integrating and infusing occult mysticism to corrupt the plain Gospel message of salvation. It needed to become desensitized to discerning pagan spirituality. It needed to embrace God as a female deity.

The Truth:
Karen concluded her report on her research into Gaia with the following astute observation:
“Now is the opportune moment for a planetary faith that proclaims the Earth to be divine. Devotees of Gaia have deserted the biblical mandate of being the Earth’s stewards and overseeing the created order. In exchange they have accepted servitude under the rule of nature’s wiles. Gaians are equal with the ant and so can join the ant in being washed away by the millions should Gaia’s mood turn fretful.

“If Gaia worship becomes a recognized religion it could fit handily into a centralized international order. By definition, it is collectivist and anti-individual. It is generically spiritual and compulsively environmental, at best. At worst, it is a perversion of sound scientific study and a blatant propaganda machine for the environmental doomsayers.” 
Berit Kjos' 1992 book warning about Mother Earth
is now online HERE.


“And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols?
for ye are the temple of the living God;
as God hath said, I will dwell in them,
and walk in them;
and I will be their God,
and they shall be my people.
Wherefore come out from among them,
and be ye separate, saith the Lord,
and touch not the unclean thing
;
and I will receive you,”

(2 Corinthians 6:16-17) 

“I am the LORD thy God,
which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt,
out of the house of bondage.
Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image,
or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above,
or that is in the earth beneath,
or that is in the water under the earth:
Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them,
nor serve them:
…”

(Exodus 20:2-5a) 




Endnotes:
1. Missionary Spencer Smith critique this and documented it on YouTube, “Hillsong Christmas 2019 Review - Pagan Goddesses, Occult Symbols, and Eastern Religions...,” January 8, 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJ8OTEaWrIo&feature=youtu.be. Be aware that Hillsong employed occult symbolism and erotic dancing in this video. 
2.  Karen Kurth, “What on Earth is Gaia?” Iowa Report (Vol. 1, No. 2), December 1992. Bibliography for this article includes: 
Allen Hunt Badiner, Dharma Gaia (A harvest of Essays in Buddhism and Ecology; Lawrence E. Joseph, Gaia (The Growth of an Idea) ; Elisabet Sahouris, Ph.D., Gaia (The Human Journey From Chaos to Cosmos); William Irwin Thompson, G.A.I.A. (A Way of Knowing; Political Implications of the New Biology); William Harman, Global Mind Change (The New Age Revolution in the Way We Think); Dr. Frank Barnaby, The Gaia Peace Atlas; James Locklock, Gaia (A New Look at Life on Earth); Judith Duerk, Circle of Stones (Woman’s Journey to Herself); Wanda Marrs, New Age Lies to Women; Johanna Michaelson, Like Lambs to the Slaughter (See Appendix D, “Queen of Heaven”); Tal Brooke, SCP Journal, Vol. 16:1, 1991 
3. Loren Wilkinson, “Gaia spirituality: a Christian critique,” Themelios (Vol. 18, No. 3), April 1993, https://themelios.thegospelcoalition.org/article/gaia-spirituality-a-christian-critique/. Themelios is a journal now published by The Gospel Coalition – see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Themelios. In this article, Loren Wilkinson does not oppose Gaia. Rather, he lays out the entire plan for Gaia, even including ecofeminism, and favorably citing New Age New World Order leaders such as Maurice Strong, James Lovelock, Riane Eisler, Starhawk, Matthew Fox, etc. 
4. These facts have been widely reported by the press across the world. Here is a brief summary: https://www.nowtheendbegins.com/pope-francis-ecological-sin-changing-catechism-roman-catholic-church-gaia-worship-vatican/ and also: https://www.nowtheendbegins.com/pope-francis-welcomes-female-shaman-vatican-leads-worship-service-dedicated-to-inca-goddess-pachamama-amazon-mother-earth/ 
5. We’ve published many posts about this. See the Herescope “Networking to Global Governance,” archived with additional material on http://www.crossroad.to/articles2/007/discernment/2-26-networking-4.htm. See also “Brian McLaren to speak at World Future Society,” Herescope, 3/24/08, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2008/03/brian-mclaren-to-speak-at-world-future.html and “The Spiritualization of Science,” Herescope, May 20, 2009, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2009/05/spiritualization-of-science.html and follow the link to Dr. Martin Erdmann’s article of this title, http://www.clinam.org/images/stories/pdf/volume2.1.pdf.
6. Sumatra Maitra, “Climate Worship Is Nothing More Than Rebranded Paganism,” The Federatlist, September 26, 2019, https://thefederalist.com/2019/09/26/climate-worship-is-nothing-more-than-rebranded-paganism/ 
7. Magazine cover from author’s files, a New Age publication, Body Mind Spirit, July August 1990. 
8. Jeff Maples, “Baptist University Invites Native American Mystic to Preach, Opens and Closes With Prayer to ‘Mother Mystery’,” Reformation Charlotte, February 13, 2020, https://reformationcharlotte.org/2020/02/13/baptist-university-invites-native-american-mystic-to-preach-opens-and-closes-with-prayer-to-mother-mystery/. This quote links over to a previous article by Jeff Maple, posted on Reformation Charlotte on September 27, 2019, titled “Campus Crusade Leaver Invites Roman Catholics and Mystics to Speak at Event,” https://reformationcharlotte.org/2019/09/27/campus-crusade-leader-invites-roman-catholic-mystic-to-speak-at-event/.
9. Francis X. Rocca of the Wall Street Journal reported on this on November 15, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/ARTICLES/POPE-FRANCIS-WEIGHS-ADDING-ECOLOGICAL-SIN-TO-CHURCH-TEACHINGS-11573839966 
10. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inanna 
11. See “Resetting the Reformation,” July 15, 2016, Herescope, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2016/07/resetting-reformation.html. Also see Understand the Times News Alert for information about Hillsong’s prior relationship with Pope Francis: http://understandthetimes.org/inthenews/1093_owrna.shtml and follow the links. 
12. Missionary Spencer Smith critique  “Hillsong Christmas 2019 Review - Pagan Goddesses, Occult Symbols, and Eastern Religions...,” Ibid. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJ8OTEaWrIo&feature=youtu.be.
13. This blueprint is described in the post “The EMERGENT BLUEPRINT,” October 6, 2010, Herescope, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2010/10/emergent-blueprint.html and follow the many links. 
14. See “The Emerging Order,” Herescope, October 12, 2010, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2010/10/emerging-order.html 
15. Constance Cumbey, the Detroit attorney who first exposed the agenda of the New Age Movement to evangelicals, was attacked as “conspiracy hunter” in another article published in Themelios (Vol. 16, No. 3). This article by Steve Bishop attempts to forge a common ground with earth-centered spirituality. https://themelios.thegospelcoalition.org/article/green-theology-and-deep-ecology-new-age-or-new-creation/.
16. See “Reframing Jesus,” Herescope, Feb. 29, 2008, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2008/02/reframing-jesus.html. Also see “Earth: The Old Story, The New Story,” Herescope, May 29, 2008, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2008/05/earth-old-story-new-story.html
17. An explanation of this can be found in the article by Sarah Leslie titled “What Is Dominionism?” posted at http://apprising.org/2011/01/26/what-is-dominionism/ 
18. See “The Great Global Gaia Conference,” Herescope, Nov. 9, 2015, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2015/11/the-great-global-gaia-conference-of-1993.html. See also “Parliament of the World’s Religions 2015,” Herescope, October 20, 2015, http://herescope.blogspot.com/2015/10/parliament-of-worlds-religions-2015.html
19. “Networking P.E.A.C.E. – Part 4: Networking to Global Governance,” Herescope, February 15, 2007, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2007/02/networking-peace-part-4.html. This Herescope article is reposted at http://www.crossroad.to/articles2/007/discernment/2-26-networking-4.htm 
20. See “NAR Apostles For ‘Social Justice’: Coalescing with Southern Baptists,” Herescope, Oct. 8, 2015, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2015/10/nar-apostles-for-social-justice.html and be sure to read the last section of “Civic Church Anti-Semitism,” Herescope, July 27, 2019, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2019/07/civic-church-anti-semitism.html
21. Before there was a Discernment Research Group, there was the Iowa Research Group. Karen Kurth, Marla Quenzer and Sarah Leslie, among others, were friends who were working against a bad homeschool persecution in Iowa in 1990 and stumbled onto the education reform agenda, and also global education and Gaia. Our story is also documented in Charlotte Iserbyt’s book the deliberate dumbing down of america (Conscience Press. 1999) and also “Big Bad Cows and Cars,” http://herescope.blogspot.com/2019/02/big-bad-cows-and-cars.html 
22. Some of this story is also recounted on Berit Kjos’s website: “Transformation: From The Old Story to The New Story,” https://www.crossroad.to/charts/new-story.htm
23. This photo of James Lovelock with his marble Gaia statue can be found on his Wikipedia page. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Lovelock and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Lovelock#/media/File:James_Lovelock_in_2005.jpg 
24. See “Quantum Eschatology,” Herescope, July 24, 2009, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2009/07/quantum-eschatology.html and “Esoteric Evolution,” Herescope, March 27, 2019, https://herescope.blogspot.com/2019/03/. 
25. This exhibit is from an article at: http://www.canada.com/story_print.html?id=4597840&sponsor= that states: “Bolivia will this month table a draft United Nations treaty giving "Mother Earth" the same rights as humans…. It also establishes a Ministry of Mother Earth, and provides the planet with an ombudsman whose job is to hear nature's complaints as voiced by activist and other groups, including the state.” 
26. Maike Hickson article at LifeSite News, Oct. 18, 2019, regarding the Pope’s Amazon Synod which included a pagan idol and a “Gaia liturgy.” Read about it here: https://www-lifesitenews-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.lifesitenews.com/mobile/blogs/prominent-german-journalists-criticize-gaia-liturgyand-adoration-of-pachamamaat-vatican-synod?amp_js_v=a3&_gsa=1&usqp=mq331AQFKAGwASA%3D#aoh=15824419537285&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&_tf=From%20%251%24s&share=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.lifesitenews.com%2Fblogs%2Fprominent-german-journalists-criticize-gaia-liturgyand-adoration-of-pachamamaat-vatican-synod 

Friday, February 14, 2020

Dominionism!

A Book Review

Dominionism! available HERE



Reviewed by Sarah H. Leslie

Dominionism!
How Unbiblical Action Can Change The Churches

A book authored by Dr. Orrel Steinkamp and Sandy Simpson


Dominionism is the idea of building a paradise on earth. It is zealously espoused by both the political Right and the political Left, and each side agitates with a religious fervor for their versions of the cause. Dominionism claims to save the earth, not individual souls in need of redemption by Jesus Christ. In order to achieve its utopian goals, Dominionism believes that the ends justify the means. Dominionist leaders are intent on transforming political, social, religious and cultural institutions in order to foment their revolution. They champion new and old forms of totalitarianism to attain results. Their final solution is planetary transformation. Various Christian and New Age versions of Dominionism include the idea of mankind achieving godhood, thus perfecting the planet, and they've shown they are willing to work together, converging their politics. But in the process you will have to give up your rights and freedoms.

Given the significant increase in Dominionism as a religious force for transformation in society, the recent book Dominionism! published by Sandy Simpson at Deception in the Church is timely and needed.

Full disclosure: There are several chapters in this book Dominionism! that were authored by me. Also I was supposed to have assisted in the editing of this book; however family life circumstances the past few years kept me from being able to work on this project. Furthermore, Dr. Steinkamp and I originally intended to publish our six-part article series, either as 6 more chapters in this manuscript or as its own book(let). These six articles remain published as posts on Herescope and they supplement the information contained in the book Dominionism!:

Part 1: The PASSION of the PRESENCE & the Purpose of the Passion:  
Part 2: “Presence” Eschatology  
Part 3: Bridal Eschatology 
Part 4: The Perfectly Obedient Bride  
Part 5: The 2nd Coming of the “Presence” 
Part 6: The Battled Bride  

C. Peter Wagner letter, August 20, 2007

Dominionism! Described

The Preface of Dominionism! states that "the title and cover art of this work are a play off of the book by C. Peter Wagner," the chief "apostle" who set up the New Apostolic Reformation movement (NAR) several decades ago. In 2008 Wagner published his book with its audacious and aggressive dominion agenda for the Christian church aptly titled Dominion! How Kingdom Action Can Change the World. Wagner spelled out a radical political, religious and social transformation agenda. His landmark book set up the blueprint for a unique form of Church Dominionism he called "building the 7 Mountains" (see graphic above) that described the Church taking over "7 spheres" of culture. This agenda that would go on to shape the evangelical church world with its potent leaven for the next decade.

Incredibly, in retrospect we note that C. Peter Wagner got a free pass from the Christian media, the mainstream media, and so-called conservative church leaders in the evangelical world who all should have opposed him. Rather, by the time Wagner published his book Dominion! most of evangelicaldom was already being seduced by the doctrines and practices of Dominionism. Who wrote about C. Peter Wagner, warning about his agenda? A handful of Leftists who were concerned about his overt political agenda, and a handful of online discernment ministries such as DITC. That's it!

Wagner's book
The two authors of the book Dominionism! have been lifelong missionaries. They both served as key apologists in the discernment world: Sandy Simpson of Deception in the Church and Dr. Orrel Steinkamp of Plumbline Ministries. These two men monitored the rise of C. Peter Wagner and his cohort of "apostles and prophets" for the past three decades and issued many warnings about their findings. I first became acquainted with them in the 1990s when our mutual friend, the late researcher Ed Tarkowski, set up the first Internet discussion loop on discernment issues.

During that time we were all observing the formative years of the New Apostolic Reformation. C. Peter Wagner had just connected the "Kansas City Prophets" with John Wimber. Promise Keepers and the Toronto and Brownsville laughing phenomena were all taking off. These groups were coalescing and spinning new theologies. There was a flagrant exuberance as the old Pentecostals crossed over to become full-fledged adherents to the Charismatic movement, complete with its "signs and wonders" and claims of health and wealth. Ordinary evangelical church folks began succumbing to many of these teachings, especially via the indoctrination of the evangelical media and music industry. Calling this larger movement "the River," the stated goal of its leaders was to flood their heresies into every denomination and church group, thereby "breaking down the walls." Musical lyrics took on Dominionist themes and pretty soon young people were singing new doctrines. Bethel became a household word. This dissemination of corrupt theology is how the leaven of the New Apostolic Reformation infiltrated most of the church world. It was wildly successful.

The history of this movement is important. Dominionism! explains both the roots and the fruits of the modern-day Dominionism. As the book notes,

many churches have already been changed by accepting the false teachings that constitute Dominionism.... Dominionism is one of the "footholds" the enemy has in the churches today.... Churches need to be made aware that the precepts of Dominionism have made their way into every gateway left unguarded by Christian leaders. Those gateways include much worship music, many Bible study programs, a number of online sermon notes, many women's meeting study guides, some available youth programs, magazines put out by Word of Faith and New Apostolic sources, ecumenical prayer efforts, and of course "Christian" TV.
(Deception in the Church website)

To compile this book Sandy Simpson carefully selected key writings that he and Dr. Steinkamp authored during the time period that the dominion agenda unfolded. These articles have been turned into chapters for Dominionism! The chapters represent both describe the heresy and contrast it to biblical doctrine. Key concepts such as Kingdom Now, spiritual warfare, the Word-Faith connection, eschatology, and signs and wonders are explained and refuted.

Dominionism! serves as a handy overview. The concerned reader who really wants to get to the historical meat of the matter will want to use this book as a research tool to delve into the many Internet articles and posts that are cited. Unfortunately, the hyperlinks don't carry over, but it is possible to search out the referenced material and footnotes to find more reading. Most of these chapters have been previously published online which makes this process easier.

The Truth:
Sandy Simpson sums up the crux of the problem in his Conclusion:
The true work of world evangelism is basically over, having occurred from the mid 1850's through the mid 1950's. What has been happening since then is a apostatizing of Biblical truth accompanied by a shoveling in of all kinds of heresies to fill the void. When an organization takes the Gospel out of the equation, it will, as has been observed, try to fill that void with programs and ideas of saving the planet and taking over everything for Christ.

"And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven,
having the everlasting Gospel
to preach unto them that dwell on the earth,
and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people.
Saying with a loud voice,
'Fear God, and give glory to Him;
for the hour of His judgment is come:
and worship Him that made heaven, and earth,
and the sea, and the fountains of waters.'"

(Revelation 14:6-7)


The book Dominionism! can be acquired HERE.

For further reading see the key article "7 Mountain Politics and Theology" and follow the many article links.

Saturday, February 08, 2020

A Man and his Angel

A Book Review 



Read the book HERE


Reviewed by Sarah H. Leslie


A Man and His Angel -
A Biblical Examination of William Branham's Practices and Teachings:
A Compendium of the Prophet's Legac
y
 

A book authored by Mike Oppenheimer, Let Us Reason Ministries


It is time to shed light on the life and teachings of one of the past century's most notorious and influential heretics, William Branham, whose bad theological leaven has now permeated much of the church world. For many long decades the evangelical media establishment elite has ignored the writings of good discernment experts warning about this man. The evangelical media elite has systematically worked to avoid dealing with his key doctrinal heresies that have influenced generations of evangelical church-goers. Worse, they've lauded the leaders teaching his heresies with high profile accolades, provided them tons of positive press, even propelling them to stardom. Mega-buck$ were made by all.

The evangelical establishment publishing industry has unwaveringly declined to publish high quality discerning books or articles. Thus solid ministries like Mike Oppenheimer's Let Us Reason Ministries have resorted to publishing their own books. This highly esteemed evangelical class of elites frequently states that we only need to preach the truth. They base this on the claim that their preaching is enough, that people in their pews can "figure it out" about false teachers on their own. This flimsy, unbiblical excuse enables pastors to ignore their charge to warn precious sheep about hungry wolves roaming in the flock. Especially they fail to name the wolves by name.

In sum, the evangelical media establishment elite has not only promoted the false teachings that began with Branham but, worse, they have failed to provide a platform to those who would warn about him. This has been a recipe for disaster. False teachers like William Branham have gotten a free pass for so many generations that his bad leaven has now permeated much of the church world. Most people in the pews have never heard of William Branham, nor have they ever heard a warning about him. But it is likely that he affects their faith, their music, their popular Christian books and their favorite teachers on the conference circuits.

(Source)
The Poison of Branham's Leaven
It is a privilege to refer our readership to a book by longtime researcher, Mike Oppenheimer. We first became acquainted with Mike during the 1990s when the late Ed Tarkowski formed the first Internet discernment research and discussion loop. Mike's detailed book is a treasure trove documenting the complete history and beliefs of William Branham. It is a perfect book for those who want to do in-depth research on Branham. Once and for all Branham -- his crazy behavior, controversial history, strange personal life and aberrant beliefs -- has been nailed to the wall effectually and with great attention to accuracy. Here is a brief summary of the book's significance:

In the history of modern healing ministries one person stands out more than any other, William Branham. Over fifty years after his death there are few men that continue to influence the Church and today’s modern healing ministries. Branham’s influence is more extensive today than in his day when he was alive.
William Branham is the main influence for the Latter Rain movement in the late 1940’s that infected so many Pentecostals. He left us the legacy of the healing revivals and signs and wonders, he is also one of the primary sources of the “river” that is flowing today that is the resurgence of the Latter Rain movement....
What you will find in this book is that so many of the errors Branham taught and practiced have been adopted and have become the errors in the church today. Many have no idea that the Word Faith, Latter Rain Third Wave teachers are following in the footsteps of William Branham. This book makes it clear where their teachings and practices come from.

In reading through A Man and his Angel, the section on "The Many Healing Ways; The Operation of Occultism" is particularly devastating to Branham's image of being a Christian.

Branham taught a blend of Kabbalah, Theosophy, Rosicrucianism, Mysticism and Gnosticism. All of it was presented wrapped in Christian terminology to the people. Branham was a man deep into the occult arts. And they called him great, having the power of God, much as they did Simon [Magnus] in Acts 8:9-12.... (p. 280)
(Source)
Branham's Mysticism
The story of William Branham is intertwined with the earliest history of the Pentecostal movement. The reader goes back in time to the earliest decades of the Pentecostal movement when doctrines and practices were chaotic and unfiltered. Mike Oppenheimer has tackled the topic head-on with a definitive history on the life of Branham. His book is a formidable compilation of documentation on not only the life of Branham but all of the people, places and events that influenced his bizarre theology. Oppenheimer does a good job of contrasting truth with the error, so the reader is not just getting Branham’s heresies but also receiving good biblical teaching that refutes it.

This book is a fascinating history of Branham’s life which divulges obscure details. Branham arose to fame during the early decades in the last century where cults were abounding, replete with unusual doctrines and strange practices. Many claimed to be in contact with the spirit world, and some asserted that angels taught them new doctrines. One of the chief doctrines being altered was the concept of the Trinity, or Godhead. This gave rise to heresies such as Oneness, Jesus Only, Adoptionism, etc. Another doctrine was the idea that the church as Christ’s Bride was coming to maturity and could gain dominion over the earth; i.e., Dominionism. Since the 1980s these teachings have had a massive resurgence, adapting to the times and becoming widespread throughout the church world. Only a handful of discernment ministries warned about this onslaught, including Mike Oppenheimer at his Let Us Reason website.

By all accounts Branham was extremely erratic and eccentric. Branham retold his story multiple times throughout his life and this book exposes the extraordinary inconsistencies in his own testimony. One day he would state one thing, another day he would say something totally contradictory. He would exaggerate and inflate facts, often to absurd excess. Something was not right with the man – either he was intentionally lying or he had serious cognitive problems. He was indeed spiritually reprobate.

The historical records documented in A Man and his Angel quickly stack up to indicate that Branham told different stories depending on the group he was addressing. He put forth many wildly different account about how he became "spirit" filled, for example. He was prone to gross exaggeration, and frequently puffed up his spiritual experiential credentials, especially when describing his extrasensory  experiences with lights, tongues, angels, etc.

Many of Branham’s mystical beliefs seemed to come straight out of the occult, especially Theosophy. His views even paralleled certain aspects of Mormonism. He believed in an evolution that took trillions of years, not the biblical account in Genesis. Branham got the plain Bible account of the Creation all mixed up and obsessed on varying revisions of the Creation story throughout his life, often making wild claim about earth’s and man’s origins. He believed in a spiritual evolution where God created androgynous male and females.

In fact, Branham had a horrible view of women, that “every sin that ever was on the Earth was caused by a woman… the very lowest creature on the Earth.” (p. 249) It even gets downright creepy as he obsesses that women are sinfully beautiful because “Satan designed her.” “She is designed, alone, for filth and unclean living.” (p. 250)

(Source)

Branham's Dominionism
Other Branham beliefs were also peculiar:

“God wrote three Bibles: one, the Zodiac, one in the pyramids, one on paper.” (53-0509, The Pillar of Fire, Bible Hour Tabernacle, Jonesboro, AR). (p. 197)

He was also panentheistic:

“God is in nature. God is in His church. God is just all around.” (58-0302, Door To The Heart, Memorial Auditorium, Chattanooga, TN) (p. 198) 

Branham held to a curious belief that Jesus was dead in his mother’s womb until He was born, not unlike what was taught in ancient Gnosticism. In fact, he believed that all babies were spirits until born. Obviously such a belief would contribute to the modern-day abortion argument. Here is just one of many examples of Branham’s outrageous statements:

“that unborn children are not alive until they take their first breath. “You say, ‘Oh, it’s alive!’ No, it isn’t! That’s little nerves jerking, muscles.… The baby hasn’t received life till it’s born.” (Seven Church Ages, pp. 275-286.) (p. 204) 

Branham’s Gnostic teachings included the idea that men have pre-existent spirits, not unlike Karma in Hinduism, telling folks that a “little angel, little spirit… comes into the body” of a baby. (p. 216) and that “And then, first, man was made, he was a spiritman, in the image of God.”(p. 254) In fact, he egotistically proclaimed he himself was pre-existent “with Moses at the burning bush,” saw the Red Sea parted, and was with John the Baptist and Lazarus and in the Upper Room! (p. 229)

Branham also taught that “When God made man in His image, He made him a theophany. And He only placed him in flesh....”(p. 255) Mike Oppenheimer explains that theophany literally means God appearance, i.e., a god, which is taught by both the occult and cults:

To say Adam was made spirit, a theophany first and is God (before he was made from the earth) clearly is heresy. This where we find all the Word Faith teachings based on today.
According to Branham the soul and the spirit of man are the same and they are God. Adam was then God in the flesh.(p. 255) 

Worse, Branham, talking to Pentecostals, told them “each one of you is a creator,” “ye are gods,’” and “man himself is Deity.” Oppenheimer observes that “here Branham introduces the ‘manifest sons of God’ teaching that was incorporated in the Latter Rain movement, which in our generation has given rise to the New Apostolic Reformation. (p. 265) Branham’s taught that since God made man a god, “he gave him a dominion, and he had rulership” over the earth (p. 270). This is the seedbed of Branham’s dominionism. It is this view that has so totally permeated large segments of the evangelical church world today.

Branham said he had a supernatural birth replete with signs and wonders. He made the preposterous claim that he had seen visions in the womb, at eighteen months old, and at 3 years old, and then “tens of thousands of visions,” “hundreds of thousands of visions,” and “thousands times thousands of visions.” (p. 227-228) The fact that statements like this are bizarre on their face should have set off red flags. But to this day many in the church follow Branham's heretical precepts without any clue as to the occult origins of his heresies.

Oppenheimer points out that Branham’s beliefs were highly influential and notes how remarkable similiarities can be seen in the aberrant Word-Faith doctrines of Benny Hinn, Kenneth Copeland and Kenneth Hagin. The reader of A Man and his Angel will find extraordinary parallels to modern-day teachings promulgated by huge segments of the evangelical church. It is a devastating fact that the evangelical elite has so nearly totally ignored this foundational issue within its own ranks. This book ought to be required reading in every seminary ministerial class!


Another Gospel
A Man and his Angel explains how William Branham taught another gospel, not the Gospel of salvation of Jesus Christ. The book summarized with the following warning to readers:
So we see that Branham taught man is a spirit in the form of man, pre-existed along with the angels (Which is when he said God made in his image and likeness Gen.1:26) before he made man out of the ground. Branham claims that man was made as a god. 

As we can see Branham often had a different interpretation than the Bible’s explanation on nearly everything that is called essential teaching. If one claims to be under the inspiration of God but says things contrary to God, denying his nature or person, then they are not anointed by God, they are NOT a prophet of God. And they should not be promoted as one but instead avoided for the spiritual safety and welfare of the church. Considering the acceptance of Branham’s doctrine through others we are in a dangerous point of church history because of his teachings spreading through those enamored with spiritual power. (p. 280)

"For there must be also heresies among you,
that they which are approved
may be made manifest among you."

(1 Corinthians 11:19)


To read A Man and his Angel go to http://www.letusreason.org/bookw.branham.htm. For those who are concerned with modern-day errors in the church, this book is a must-have for your library.

For further reading, see http://www.letusreason.org. Also see: http://www.deceptioninthechurch.com. Our Herescope blog has written numerous articles covering the history and theology of William Branham, including:

Who Invented Dominionism?
The Serpent Seed & The Nephilim
A Second Pentecost?
Presence Eschatology
David's Tent DC
7 Mountain Politics and Theology