Picture / Doug Sherring, Dargaville couldn't be further from the Beehive, where revelations of Exclusive Brethren political lobbying and espionage are fuelling Parliament's running dog-fight. [11], Meanwhile, Gordon Forlong, a Scottish lawyer turned evangelist who had played a prominent role in the Second Great Awakening in Scotland around 1859-1860 and had subsequently moved to England and founded a large congregation, Talbot Tabernacle, in Notting Hill, London, emigrated to New Zealand in 1876, where he spent the final thirty-two years of his life. Thecommunitywas, according to one report,walking at his side as he dealt with the grief and guilt of crashing his ute on Baylys Coast Rd near Dargaville, after an afternoon of drinking alcohol at Baylys Beach. Some post-1959 ministry had already been included, and this practice will be continued. Rob McLean, who was excommunicated from the church over a decade ago, said for many older Brethren, the commercial control of the church was history repeating itself. Once the couple went to the beach with some other young families and took a portable stereo, which got them temporarily banned from church. The first beginnings of the Brethren movement occurred in the 1820s, when Darby, then an Anglican clergyman in the Church of Ireland, began meeting with others who shared his serious doubts about the validity of Anglican orders and, indeed, about the biblical warrant for any sort of clerical class. "It was very strange coming out," says Diana. "When you pull out one of those Jenga blocks it can make the whole pile quite unstable. The Exclusive Brethren are a subset of the Christian evangelical movement generally described as the Plymouth Brethren. "There were real pissheads in there: they drink heaps, it's the only thing you're allowed to do." And I did. "Most girls were there to check out the guys rather than listen to the word of God. I stayed briefly with my aunt and uncle in Palmerston North, and in January 2008 I was sent on to stay in Sydney under the watchful eye of Bruce Hales himself. The broker, whom RNZ has agreed not to name, said while they were not doing anything illegal, he was uncomfortable with the way in which the church treated former members in particular. He wrote a prescription for Cyprostat, a hormonal suppressant usually reserved for sex offenders and prostate cancer patients. We went to work in businesses owned by Brethren; we socialised with Brethren; saw them at church every night, and enjoyed the benefits of a life fully provided. Aformer member believes Stewart hasbeen 'shut up' a Brethren term which is usually the first step towards being excommunicated, andmeans the person is barred from speaking to other members of the church, eating or socialising with them, and from attending the daily church meetings which everyone is expected to attend. Members who break rules are required to confess their sin during church meetings and demonstrate their repentance. They are not allowed to form friendships with people outside the church, who are known as 'worldlies'. Now 30, the journalist reflects on a decade of laughter and heartache. I had further meetings with Bruce Hales, and he told me to consult a Brethren doctor to receive treatment for my "condition". Simmons has not gone quietly and is paying the price. Other members who have been through the justice system have also been "withdrawn from" when members are ordered to sever ties completely with the accused. Helen Clark's calling for Don Brash to step down as National Party leader because of his now-renounced relations with Exclusive Brethren lobbyists. The Green Party's demanding the group loses its exemption from labour laws requiring union access to work sites, since the cosying up to political parties makes a mockery of the basis for that exemption - finding association with any outside organisation unconscionable. I've been chased, tear-gassed, and had a few close calls with petrol bombs. Latest items: Subscribe to RSS headline updates from: Powered by FeedBurner, Abusive Churches/Spiritual Abuse Cult FAQ. If they do not, they are banned from worship or are isolated from family and only allowed to see particular church members until the ordained priests decide that God has forgiven the "sinner". This examination delves deeper into the groups past, revealing the Brethrens 19th-century origins in the United Kingdom, their fractious history, their extraordinary use of scripture to control members and dissidents, and their lucrative business and financial arrangements. "We are accused of being secretive; it's more that we want to keep our heads down and live according to our convictions. The companies themselves were also interconnected through supply chains and personal relationships, controlled by the church's supreme leader Bruce Hales, who took a close personal interest in their performance, he said. Open Brethren do not have the restrictions Exclusive Brethren face. Separate Lives [Transcripts | Video] An edition of the Four Corners investigative journalism TV program of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Petrie, then 74, was jailed for2 years for the offences. As well as forcing Brethren businesses to purchase locked-down computers, phones and IT services, UBT also charged "consultancy fees", which could amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars, and even started taking controlling stakes in profitable companies through a venture called Vision Accelerator. It was a bright spring day when I got one final phone call from a priest. The leaders get the children drinking it. "I got on very well with my father, and I was never there in the years you want to be there, when they get old and you want to do their lawns." So that's a very, very unsatisfactory situation for Bruce Hales.". We address doctrines and practices of Christian churches and organizations, as well as those of cults of Christianity. A happy Craig as a baby on his dad's lap at the piano. NZ POLICE Russell Stewart,. You can't ever really escape a Brethren upbringing. A few weeks later that same reporter got in touch and asked if I would consider telling my story on 60 Minutes. Through SGnLS (Southland Gay and Lesbian Support) I met other gay people, and realised I was not alone in the world. We had virtually no contact with people outside the Exclusive Brethren, and there were rules for every part of our lives. *Their names have been changed to protect their identities. Exclusive Brethren Rules, with documentation This is a list of rules ("directives") made by James Taylor Junior for his followers, known as the Taylorite Branch of the Exclusive Brethren. After all, I had been sent to Sydney from New Zealand so my sexuality could be suppressed, not indulged. We held back from each other it's hard to trust someone again when you've closed off that part of your heart but our reservations fell away the day before I left for Hong Kong. This is far from the Open Brethren idea that individual churches should have a great deal of freedom in their dealings with others. Since 2003 an Exclusive Brethren trust has set up 15 year 7-12 schools here, teaching about 1000 children. Sarah and her producer, Charlotte, took a keen interest in my circumstances as we travelled and filmed together, and asked what I wanted to do with my life. Like many other movements that came to be regarded as sectarian, the Brethren began with a profound and deeply anti-sectarian sentiment, and they still reject the designation sect. This study was formerly hosted at theexclusivebrethren.com the only site endorsed by the Exclusive Brethren. The site has since been renamed to plymouthbrethrenchristianchurch.org, to reflect the movements 2012 name change. It meant no TV, radio or recorded music, no pets, parties, school outings, plays or. influencing the lives of the brethren and leading to a deeper apprehension of the Lords Supper and the enrichment of the service of God. A flowchart illustrates how the Exclusive Brethren - or Plymouth Brethren Christian Church - money-go-round works. Perhaps the best-known Foster Crane, a missionary to Fiji, closed ranks to oppose what they stood for. While Open Brethren tolerate autonomy in individual congregations, Exclusive Brethren do not. Yet the Brethren experience hovers in my periphery; a mesh of traumatic memories. I was a seventh-generation member of the Plymouth/Exclusive Brethren. It was a catastrophic reordering of life, and other experiences don't come close. Brethren have built 36 Campus & Co supermarkets in New Zealand for their members' exclusive use, staffed partly by "volunteers". They were a picture of languid happiness, sitting there in the sun. One of them lifted his bare feet onto the lap of the other and leaned back in his chair. I stared in fascination. "That's news to me. Little did we know we'd make the evening news. This magazine, founded in 1899 by Charles Hinman,[27] long played a leading role in keeping the highly independent Brethren assemblies together as a network. Long before Exclusive Brethren men hired a private investigator to dig dirt on the Prime Minister and other Labour politicians, before Brethren tried to pressure several political parties into a National-led coalition, before the so-called "Secret Seven" Brethren businessmen put almost $1 million into anti-Labour and anti-Green pamphlet campaigns at last year's election, members of this fundamental Christian fellowship have been part of the commercial fabric of this town, and the wider Kaipara district. Within this site you will find explanations, stories, history and Exclusive Brethren memorabilia ranging from the quaint to the shocking. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. "It's like the inside of a golf ball in there, everything is all tied together, with a very centralised structure and power dynamic.". The Exclusive Brethren is the name given (by outsiders) to those among the so-called Plymouth Brethren who, in the mid-nineteenth century, joined John Nelson Darby ( 1800-82) in forming a Christian fellowship which they believed to be based on strict biblical principles. Church spokesperson Doug Watt said the decision to purchase or work with UBT or the Vision Foundation was "entirely an individual business decision that occurs in a competitive marketplace". A cult-like church that exerts almost complete control over its members has metastasised into a multinational corporation with massive buying power. Former members say the church has a centralised hierarchy, and everyone is expected to show absolute loyalty to the Sydney-based supreme leader Bruce Hales. As a young child the chorus mystified me. This early conception of Christian fellowship, based on minimal organization, proved within the course of a decade and a half to be inadequate for the maintenance of an integrated separate community. And representations of Brethren women as oppressed are "rubbish. I'm happy and independent, and loving it. [32], GC3 is an umbrella organisation encompassing three institutions: Global Connections in Mission (GCiM), which supports 150 missionaries abroad as well as almost 100 evangelists in New Zealand,[3] GC Assist, an "operations trust" within GC3 which runs, among other projects, Headspace, a one-year program for school leavers,[33] and GC Aid, a humanitarian NGO.[34]. Divorce is rare. It was one of the worst cases of neglect to come before a racing authority. Another ex-member, whom RNZ has agreed not to name, said he managed to hold onto his position in the family business, despite huge pressure from church leaders - but said many others were not so fortunate. 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