http://www.holysmoke.org/hs00/fascism.htm
COR Comes To Colorado Springs
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by Mike Fisher
If the Colorado Springs didn't have enough Christian political organizations
headquartered here preaching intolerance, we will have a real winner this
summer. Coalition on Revival (COR), a reconstructionist organization, has
announced it will be moving to Colorado Springs in June.
COR has plans to launch a "boot camp training school for radical
world-changers" called Kingdom College. The purpose of Kingdom College is to
train Christian Reconstructionists to "systematically and effectively
rebuild their civilization on Biblical principles."
Reconstructionism or theonomy, holds that Old Testament laws, as interpreted
by the New Testament, are required for all societies. Theonomists oppose
plurality and the separation of Church and State and advocate a Biblical
theocracy. In Grimstead's 24-point master plan, he proposes Christian
takeovers in virtually all aspects of human endeavor: education, the arts,
politics, the courts and even the military. In a May 1993 letter to COR
friends, Grimstead writes, "At this moment of history, all humans on earth,
whether Jew or Gentile, believer or unbeliever, private person or public
official, are obligated to bow their knees to this King Jesus, confess Him
as Lord of the universe with their tongues, and submit to His lordship over
every aspect of their lives in thought, word and deed."
Many Reconstructionists focus particularly on biblical prescriptions of
capital punishment for such offenses as blasphemy, adultery, homosexuality,
witchcraft, striking or cursing a parent and promiscuity. A society based on
Reconstructionism would include no prison system--criminals would either be
executed for their crimes or work as indentured servants to make restitution
to their victims. There would be no credit system or public school
education; indigents would be forced to work off their debts as slaves and
children would be schooled at home.
COR's list of steering committee members have included such political
Christian right leaders as Dr. Tim and Beverly LaHaye of Concerned Women of
America, Dr. Robert Simonds of Citizens for Excellence in Education, Dr.
James Kennedy (who in conjunction with village Seven Presbyterian Church is
opening a branch of Knox Theological Seminary here), Dr. R.J. Rushdoony and
Pat Robertson's Regent University Board Chair, Dee Jepson. Because of COR's
controversial beliefs and plans, some members have left the committee and
others deny any connection with COR. Even Focus on the Family is a little
uncomfortable with Reconstructionists. At a recent Community Impact Seminar,
a Focus on the Family representative referred to Reconstructionists as
"wing-nuts."
As a recent example of what we can expect from Grimstead and COR, here are
excerpts from a letter to William B. Allen, who was running against
Representative Bill Dannemeyer for the Republican nomination for the U.S.
Senate. Grimstead wanted Allen to withdraw from the Republican primary so
Dannemeyer could receive the nomination.
"This letter comes to tell you that we are calling on you, in the name of
Jesus Christ the King of the universe, to immediately step down from this
foolish attempt at the Senate seat and to publicly announce that you are
throwing your weight and your campaign behind the Dannemeyer effort for
victory...If, however, you choose to continue on this reckless,
unaccountable, foolish path you may count on three consequences:
1. We will not only work harder than ever for the Dannemeyer campaign but we
will also expose to our Christian networks the foolishness and
destructiveness of your efforts and encourage them to see your campaign for
what it truly is: a political abortion that can only aid the forces of
darkness.
2. Any hopes you have for political office in this state will be greatly
hindered for years to come...
3. We suspect that God Himself will make efforts to discipline you and judge
this action of yours however He sees fit. As anyone who has been disciplined
by our Heavenly Father can tell you, He can deal very forcibly with us."
COR is a small organization with a few militant followers and without the
large amounts of money that Focus or Pat Robertson have. Their impact on a
large scale may be insignificant. However, if their plans for Kingdom
College materialize, we could be in for some unwanted spiritual warfare on a
community that is already divisive along in the area of tolerance and
religion.
>>>Text of article from "Church and State" by Fred
Clarkson Pp 9-12<<<
HardCor
Mark Twain, reading today's papers, might observe that the news of the death
of the Christian Right has been greatly exaggerated.
Examples abound, but one need look no further than the thumpingly successful
crusades of the Rev. Don Wildmon's American Family Association and the
broader Christian Leaders for Responsible Television (CLEAR-TV) against
television programming they don't like. Most recently, Burger King, a
sponsor targeted by the groups, surrendered and pledged fealty to
"traditional family values" in full page ads, after a two-month boycott over
the fast food chain's commercials on allegedly racy and anti- Christian TV
shows.
But there is more to Wildmon and many of his allies than television
trouble-making. He is a member of the Steering Committee of the Coalition on
Revival (COR), a secretive, theo- political movement that seeks to bridge
theological gaps among conservative Christians and foster religious and
political unity. The movement's goal is nothing less than the establishment
of its vision of the Kingdom of God here on earth.
The Coalition is the epitome of the refocusing and retrenching of the
Christian Right in the wake of the televangelist scandals of the '80's and
the rise of the secular- minded presidency of George Bush. Its roots,
however, grow from the Religious Right's heyday during the Reagan era, and
it seeks the establishment of a government-enforced Christian nation.
Working largely behind the scenes, the movement's influence has be subtle
and significant. Prominent COR Steering Committee members have included:
televangelists D. James Kennedy and Ron Haus, Robert Dugan of the National
Association of Evangelicals, the Rev. Tim LaHaye of the Traditional Values
Coalition, former U.S. Rep Mark Siljander (R-Mich.) and Religious Roundtable
chief Ed McAteer,
Founded in 1982 by Dr. Jay Grimstead, COR has sought to create a
trans-denominational theology - a process that has included the creation of
17 "Worldview" documents, a Manifesto of the Christian Church, and a set of
25 key theological tenets called the 25 Articles. COR claims that "112
national theologians and leaders working with 500 experts in those 17
different fields worked together in 17 committees." The various COR papers
have been distributed widely among sympathizers both here and abroad.
One major focus has been to reconcile two main evangelical eschatologies
(end-times theology), Most evangelicals in this century have been
pre-millenialists/dispensationalists, that is, Christians who believe it is
not possible to reform this world until Jesus returns. The minority post-
millenialists/Reconstructionist camp believes it is necessary to build the
Kingdom of God here and now.
COR, which is led by post-millenialists and politically motivated by
pre-millenialists (like Tim LaHaye), has sought to impose a non-quarrelling"
policy on such matters. In response to a "Theological Summit" last year
between COR advocates and critics, one critic astutely observed to
Christianity Today that COR avoids defining both the means and ends of
establishing to Kingdom and that "These (25) Articles seem to be devised to
obtain if not the cooperation of the dispensationalists, at least their
neutrality.."
Indeed, the pre-millenialist/dispensationalist avoidance of entanglements
with "this world" has kept much of evangelical Christianity on the sidelines
of politics and government. COR's de-emphasis of eschatology could
effectively dissolve barriers to political participation for many and clear
the way for political leadership by the Religious Right.
Although loath to admit it, many leading evangelicals have already been
profoundly influenced by Reconstructionism, a movement that seeks to impose
some variant of Old Testament law on all society. Sociologist Sara Diamond
observes in her book Spiritual Warfare: The Politics of the Christian Right
that Reconstructionism "has become the central unifying ideology of the
Christian Right" and that COR is the cutting edge of Reconstructionism.
Reconstructionism has many variations - the "Biblical Law Revival," "Kingdom
theology," "Dominion theology"- and all are represented in COR. The
acknowledged leader of Reconstructionism, R.J. Rushdoony, is a COR Steering
Committee member who is slated to teach the biblical view of law at COR's
planned Kingdom College. Fellow Reconstructionist (and COR Steering
Committee member) Gary North has said, "Rushdoony is the Marx of this
movement. I'm trying very hard to be the Engles."
Reconstructionists seek to apply "Biblical Blueprints" to reform society,
usually according to laws found in the Old Testament. Rushdoony's extreme
views (not necessarily those of COR) include opposition to democracy and
advocacy of the death penalty for homosexuals, adulterers, blasphemers,
astrologers, witches, teachers of false doctrine and incorrigible children.
(North takes that view one step farther and insists that the preferred
biblical means of execution is stoning.) At COR's next "Theological Summit"
- scheduled for the Crystal City Marriott, near Washington, D.C., Jan. 24-26
- the application of Old Testament law to modern life will be discussed.
COR's more general "world-view" would also not bode well for American
traditions of church-state separation, pluralism, civil liberties and labor
rights. One of the "25 Articles" state in part: "We deny that anyone, Jew or
Gentile, believer or unbeliever, private person or public official is exempt
from the moral and juridical obligation before God to submit to Christ's
Lordship over every aspect of his life in thought, word, and deed."
COR "Commitment Sheets" - which must be signed by COR leaders - require that
one must be "willing to be martyred for Jesus Christ and the establishment
of His Kingdom here on earth" and be "willing to submit to the hierarchical
order that God has created in which we are willing to submit as to Christ
[emphasis added] to employers, civil government and church leaders, and
within families, wives to their husbands and children to their parents."
In 1990, COR created a political program and action arm called the National
Coordinating Council (NCC), which advocates abolition of the public schools,
the IRS and the Federal Reserve System by the year 2000, and seeks to
Christianize all aspects of life from the arts and sciences to banking and
the news media. (See "Kingdom Strategy," page 11.) The NCC hopes to
accomplish its agenda in part by setting up a "kingdom" counter-culture of
sorts, including a "Christian" court system. (In the meantime, NCC leaders
propose an "aggressive fierce Christian version of the ACLU" to fight for
its views in regular courts.)
The NCC plans call for a grass-roots effort to elect their kind of
Christians to county boards of supervisors and sheriff's offices, and
disturbingly, once in power, to establish county militias. COR chief
Grimstead says the militias are needed because the federal government can't
be trusted to defend the U.S. against an invasion from a future "Communist
Mexico." This implies, of course, not Minutemen on the Lexington Green, but
fully equipped local "Christian" armies.
The COR program is being taken to 50 North American cities over the next
five years. The method is to hold invitation-only "Merge Ministry Seminars"
geared toward the development of "councils of pastors." According to
internal documents obtained by Church and State, COR/NCC teams are coming to
San Diego, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Little Rock, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas/Fort
Worth, Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver, B.C. in 1991.
"Our present war with the forces of darkness," wrote Grimstead recently,
"will not be won in any city or county until the Christian leaders thee
deliberately form a coalition of 'spiritual generals' who will work together
as a single unit." Failing to create "such a unified D-Day approach," he
continued, "is to ensure our defeat." He has invited COR members to move to
the San Francisco Bay area this year [1991] to create a model "D- Day
effect" - and plans a national invasion of the Bay area Oct 11-20.
Grimstead's views of an ecumenism of the right may spring from his own
pilgrimage through differing religious groups. The 57 year old activist
started out in the Presbyterian tradition, but moved to an
ultra-conservative off-shoot of the main denomination. An area director of
the evangelical youth ministry Young Life for 1957 to 1877, he left that
movement to form the now-defunct Council on Biblical Inerrancy. Grimstead is
currently affiliated with a San Jose, Calif., congregation of the
Pentecostal Holiness Church, a charismatic denomination.
Grimstead believes Christian Right sympathizers can put aside theological
differences to work toward common political and societal goals. At a
COR-sponsored "Solemn Assembly" at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.
in 1986, he told one reporter, "We think we can influence every sector of
American in the next 10 years so it will be almost unrecognizable. Not just
this Coalition on Revival, but fundamentalist, evangelical, charismatic and
Catholic Christians whose foundation is the Bible and the Lordship of
Christ. We're going to bring America back to its biblical foundations.
"We're standing on a commitment to getting God's will done on earth as it is
in heaven," he observed. "We think no Christian can argue with that, because
it is part of the prayer the Lord taught us to pray. Anybody who can go for
that is with us."
Early on, Grimstead seemed to be having some success. The COR Steering
Committee, featured on the group's letterhead, includes a cross-section of
conservative Christian activists. In addition to the prominent evangelicals
mentioned earlier, names on the list include Robert Simonds of Citizens for
Excellence in Education, Reagan administration official Carolyn Sundseth,
"creation-science" advocate Duane Gish, anti-abortion leader Peter Gemma,
"pro-family" activist Connaught Marshner, home- schooling attorney Michael
Farris, Intercessors for America chairman John D. Beckett, Dennis Peacocke
and Bob Mumford of the controversial "Shepherding/Discipleship" movement,
and Edith and Franky Schaeffer, wife and son respectively of the late
evangelical guru Francis Schaeffer.
But Grimstead's radicalism seems to be threatening the group's unity. In
addition to the goals already mentioned, his recent NCC "ministry merge"
document also called for all "leadership Christians" to practice fasting and
learn how to cast out demons. Local church groups, he said, must form a
Christian voting bloc and be linked together into a "single, area-wide,
mobilizable, spiritual army."
In addition to evangelizing all junior and senior high schools, NCC goals
include taking control of all school boards, with a view toward replacing
public schools with private Christian schools by the year 2000.
Grimstead's ideas have led to some schisms with COR. Defectors include
Religious Right activist and Biblical Scorecard publisher David Balsiger,
Beverly LaHaye of Concerned Women for America, Gary Amos of Regent
University, and Robert Dugan of the National Association of Evangelicals.
Among other's who seem to be scuttling away from the taint of Rushdoony's
views and the emerging militance of COR/NCC is Don Wildmon, who actually
sued an official of the National Endowment for the Arts for slander after
she inaccurately attributed Rushdoony's views on capital punishment and
democracy to Wildmon and his American Family Association. (Rushdoony himself
is a long accepted leader in conservative circles, having served on the
Board of Governors of the elite Council for National Policy, and on the
advisory board of the Conservative Caucus and Conservative Digest.) Gary
Amos now claims that the COR/NCC agenda exists only on paper and blames it
on Grimstead. NAE's Dugan says COR has gotten too Reconstructionist for him.
In his own defense, Grimstead told Christianity Today that the COR/NCC
program is a fair representation of the views of Pat Robertson and D.James
Kennedy of Coral Ridge Ministries. Top Kennedy aides George Grant and
Charles Wolf are listed as two of the NCC's 45 activists.
The ties to Robertson are also clear. Joe Kickasola, a professor at
Robertson's Regent University (formerly CBN University), was a principal
author and with Gary Amos, defender of the 25 Articles at last year's
Theological Summit. Regent U. Board Chair (and COR Steering Committee
member) Dee Jepson is another link that shows the influence of FOR and
Reconstructionist thought.
According to Robertson, Jepson was the main advocate of the name change from
CBN to Regent University. Robertson explains that the meaning of the new
name states the mission of the school. He says a "regent" is one who governs
in the absence of a sovereign." And Regent U. trains students to rule until
Jesus, the absent sovereign, returns.
"One day, if we read the Bible correctly," he predicts, "we will rule and
reign along with our sovereign, Jesus Christ. So this is a kingdom
institution to teach people how they may enter into the privilege that they
have as God's representatives here on the face of the earth." regent U. has
700 graduate students in education, communications, religion and law - with
plans for 3,000 (possibly 12,000 through "extension programs").
The Christian Right is clearly building for the future, and COR is playing a
pivotal role by building the theological and political alliances for the
1990s and beyond.
Fred Clarkson, a Washington D.C. freelance writer, reports extensively about
the Religious Right. This story is an expanded version of a piece that
appeared in the Nov/Dec issue of Mother Jones magazine.
>>>>>TEXT OF LETTER FROM C.O.R. HEADQUARTERS TO SUPPORTERS.<<<<<
June 15
Dear friend[sic],
We wanted to communicate with you faithful donors who have been the Lord's
servants to provide our daily "manna" on this Sinai journey this past two
moths. Thank you for loving us and for caring enough about the reformation
of the Church and the rebuilding of society on a biblical base to donate to
C.O.R. We honestly could not do this ministry without your help and we are
genuinely grateful for you.
On June 18th and 19th I have a meeting in Colorado Springs with a few
national leaders to begin exploring a 25 year plan to turn our nation around
and rebuild it upon the biblical principles laid down by our founding
fathers and the Puritans of the 1600's.
Donna and I will be taking two weeks there in Colorado to have some vacation
and to look over the housing situation in Colorado Springs with the
possibility in mind of moving there next spring if God continues leading in
that direction.
As you know, the possibility of launching Kingdom College there in the fall
of 1994 is becoming more and more of a probability. This month I have met
with 6 leadership friends who would be willing and eager to move there with
us to be a team if God makes it very clear that is His call for me at this
time. The possibilities and potential are enormous. Also, the thought of my
being able to function in the work of reformation and rebuilding the
civilization upon the Bible with a team of like-minded fellow reformers who
are sold out to King Jesus is positively exciting to me. At nearly 60, I am
looking forward to establishing some long-term co-worker relationships in a
team setting with men who can become "old patriarchs" with me over the next
30 years and who will be willing to die to accomplish our mutual goals.
For you who may feel a leading from God to pray for Donna and me, please
pray for His guidance, His unmistakably clear call on my life to move my
ministry to Colorado and launch this kind of training school, or, to make it
clear that is not the plan or now is not the time. Thank you in advance if
you do that for us.
May you and your family be blessed this summer. May you financial needs be
met abundantly. May you grow speedily this next six months in those special
areas where God is working on you as he is on us.
With love and gratitude,
Jay and Donna Grimstead
>>>>TEXT OF LETTER FROM CHURCH COUNCIL STEERING COMMITTEE TO
SUPPORTERS<<< list of steering committee members to follow
Dear friends of C.O.R. and Crosswinds,
Thank you for your support of C.O.R. and your interest in Crosswinds.
This letter comes to you on the new Church Council stationery with the list
of our 40 member Steering Committee for the Church Council. Plans for the
first phase of the Council for July 25-30, 1994 are shaping up well. That
Council meeting will be held at Campus Crusade's Arrowhead Springs Hotel in
San Bernardino. If you care to do so, you may help us locate official
delegates from the different denominations, schools and organizations by
suggesting their names on the enclosed response card.
One of the 24 topics to be debated at that Church Council will be, "The
Kingdom of God and Christ's Present Rulership Over Civil Governments Today."
As you know, that is a very hot topic both for theologians and pastors
within the Church as well as for politicians, lawyers and government
officials.
Our committee is presenting to the wider body of Christ the 25 Articles on
the Kingdom of God which our theologians created, and which appears on pp.
103-113 of the Nov. issue of Crosswinds. That is the topic assigned to me
for its defense and presentation at the Church Council. It is the opinion of
most of us listed on the left hand margin that the Kingdom of God is one of
the most misunderstood doctrines of the present day evangelicalism and that
it is more central and foundational to all proper Christian thinking than
most other doctrines of the Bible.
Up until around 1830, the theologians, pastors and informed lay persons of
large portions of the Church held to a more biblical view of the Kingdom of
God than is now generally taught inmost churches worldwide. And that more
correct view was what was generally taught by those we would call the great
heroes of the Church, such as Augustine, Luther, Calvin, Knox, Wesley,
Edwards, Spurgeon, Livingstone, Warfield and Machen. That view which we
claim was taught by the mainstream Church differed in these ways from what
is generally taught mistakenly by most Bible-believing churches today.
The major leaders of the mainstream Church taught that:
1. The Kingdom of God was inaugurated and the King was installed and seated
in the First Century A.D. and we need not wait for the King's second coming
to get the Kingdom started here on earth.
2. Satan was completely defeated by Christ at the Cross and resurrection and
is therefore no longer the "ruler of this world" and can be stopped from
doing anything at any time by Christ and by us Christians if we simply
choose to employ the power and authority already placed into our hands by
the King Himself since the First Century.
3. King Jesus will be given no more power or authority at His second coming
or throughout eternity than He already was given by the Father when He
ascended to the throne of heaven.
4. At this moment of history, all humans on earth, whether Jew or Gentile,
believer or unbeliever, private person or public official, are obligated to
bow their knees to this King Jesus, confess Him as Lord of the universe with
their tongues, and submit to His lordship over every aspect of their lives
in thought, word and deed.
5. Biblical evangelism according to the Great Commission of Matt. 28:18-20
is not truly accomplished unless that message of Christ's lordship from
point #4 above is give to the person being evangelized so they know that an
attempt at personal neutrality before King Jesus is sin and treason in this
universe.
6. Submission to the lordship of Christ is essential to salvation so we may
say that no human may become a "saved" Christian who only "receives" Jesus
as his saviour without also eagerly receiving Jesus as his Lord and King at
the moment of salvation.
7. The Lord's Prayer stating that "Thy will be done on earth as it is in
heaven" was meant to be prayed by us with the hope that this condition would
happen on earth before Christ's second coming wherever and whenever the
Christians of any geography decided to band together to help make it happen.
8. The Bible is the plumb line for all Nations, Christian or non- Christian,
by which nations are to measure the justice and wisdom of all their laws,
governments, procedures and society in general.
It is easy to see that just the exact opposite of these 8 points above
(which reflect the Articles #4,8,9,10,11,13,14,18 of the Kingdom document)
is taught regularly from most Bible-loving pulpits of our land. If we are
right that the Kingdom of God is basic, and that indeed the above 8 points
are truly biblical and do reflect the general teaching of the major heroes
of the Church the first 18 centuries, then is it any wonder the Body of
Christ, which has been teaching falsehood (unknowingly) regarding these
points the past 160 years in now like the church of Laodicea: "wretched,
poor, blind and naked" and is not even aware of its own horrible
condition?!!!
By Gods' grace, this theological misunderstanding of the Church at large is
one of the matters which can be cleared up and corrected by this coming
Church Council.
If any of you have questions or concerns about what I have just said here,
feel free to write tome and tell me about it. A response card is provided
for any input you may have for us about this issue, or other items listed on
the card.
Again, we thank you for standing with us in this ministry. Please know that
your part is essential, and we are encouraged by your faithfulness.
May God help us to accomplish our destiny in him, Jay Grimstead
>>>>>Text of article from Mother Jones, by Fred Clarkson, page 11.<<< Wildmon
Kingdom?
You may have heard of Rev. Don Wildmon's crusades against porn, racy TV, and
"obscenity" in the arts - from Robert Mapplethorpe to the 2 Live Crew. But
there's more to Wildmon and many of his associates. They are part of the
Coalition on Revival, a theopolitical movement that seeks to make a
fundamentalist Christian nation out of the United States. And they may be
coming soon to a city near you.
Prominent COR members include Dr. Tim LaHaye of the Traditional Values
Coalition; televangelists Dr. D. James Kennedy and Rev. Ron Haus; former
congressman Mark Siljander; Robert Dugan, Washington lobbyist for the
National Association of Evangelicals; and Dee Jepson, board chair for Pat
Robertson's Regent University.
This year, a de facto political arm of COR called the National Coordinating
Council emerged with a twenty four-point program, a copy of which was
obtained by Mother Jones. Among other things, it calls for the abolition of
public schools, the IRS, and the Federal Reserve System by the year 2000.
While the agenda is national, its strategy is grass-roots - targeting
elections in sixty North American cities in the next five years. "We are
trying to form a political network that will be awesome," NCC chief Dr. Jay
Grimstead (who also heads COR) told Mother Jones. While hoping to take over
city councils and school boards, the group places special emphasis on county
government - sheriffs and boards of supervisors - and once in power, the
creation of county "militias." Grimstead explains that the feds can't be
trusted, thus private citizens must be armed and prepared to fight a future
"communist Mexico," which "will march across the Rio Grande."
Pilot projects are underway in Orange and Santa Clara counties in
California, and the NCC plans to organize "spiritual armies" in a dozen
cities in the next year, including Atlanta, San Diego, and Phoenix. One NCC
candidate, Sara C. Nelson, recently won a city- council seat in Gilroy,
California, according to Grimstead, "by doing it right": she ran as a
conventional politician who happens to be Christian.
A strong faction within COR follows Reconstructionism, which seeks to impose
its version of "Biblical law" on society and call it the "Kingdom of God."
While not expressing official COR policy, some Reconstructionists explicitly
oppose democracy, notably R.J. Rushdoony, Reconstructionism's acknowledged
leader. He also believes homosexuals, adulterers, blasphemers, astrologers
and incorrigible children should be executed, preferably by "stoning."
Rushdoony is a member of the COR steering committee and is slated to be a
faculty member at COR's planned Kingdom College in San Jose, California. In
a COR recruitment letter for the college, Grimstead, who says his views are
less extreme than Rushdoony's, wrote that he seeks "young warriors who will
be thrilled and challenged to go through a Christian 'green beret' boot camp
training school for radical world changers."
All NCC members are required to sign the COR manifesto, and thus have signed
pledges to be "willing to be martyred for Jesus Christ and the establishment
of His Kingdom here on earth." We tried to ask Rev. Wildmon where he stood
on Reconstructionism and the NCC program. He didn't return our calls.
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