Boston Church of Christ [ICOC] steals private journals of four men and 'disfellowships' them #unlearnreligion
****This story is ongoing, so stay tuned for future developments. This article is, by no means, written to be fully comprehensive of all that is going on here****
Check out the story here
*Picture: Ex-ICOC members Marcus Mesquitta, Justin Singletary, Arluah Wontan and Manny Chong
I just caught wind of this situation and wanted to document it for historical purposes. The Boston Movement, the ground zero ministry that went on to launch what is now known as the International Church of Christ, or ICOC, is alive and well in Boston, Massachusetts as of 2021. Members of the church constantly dismiss those of us who publicly expose the spiritual abuse of the ICOC due to what they claim are old and outdated practices. In other words, the abuse and corruption of the church supposedly doesn't happen anymore.
Let me be the first to say that this is false. The true story I am referencing in this article is evidence that a leopard doesn't change its spots. Neither does a zebra change its stripes.
The Boston Church of the ICOC hasn't changed. At one point, the media was hot on the tail of the ICOC. Everyone from investigative news documentaries to college campus newspapers to FBI watch lists were exposing the cult practices of the ICOC movement. Unfortunately, the media has let up on the ICOC in recent years, for various reasons. This is why members of the ICOC today claim that the spiritual abuse and cult dynamics are a thing of the past, what they refer to dismissively as the "old ICOC".
For those of us who were around back in the "bad old days", these ICOC defenders are referring to the "pre-Kreite letter" era. Sort of like how history is broken into "before Christ" [B.C.] and "after Christ" [A.D.]. The ICOC is B.K. [Before Kriete] and A.K. [After Kriete].
Learn [or refresh your memory] about the infamous Henry Kriete letter by clicking here.
The new "Henry Kriete Letter"
The "open letter" isn't anything new. Henry Kriete's infamous letter back in 2003 was also an open letter to the church. I myself, mass emailed an open letter before I left the ICOC back in 2006.
The open letter is considered an honorable approach to addressing church dysfunction. After all, the majority of the new testament are open letters from Paul written to churches. More often than not, Paul's letters were to address bad stuff going on. So it makes sense why we feel that writing an open letter to the church is the right thing to do.
What we find, however, is that "open letters" do little to nothing to change the toxic ICOC culture. Open letters, regardless of the heart poured into every word, or the earnest yearning to make things right, fail to penetrate a cult.
These guys, from what I see, probably wouldn't go as far as to say the ICOC is a cult. They are currently pushing a hashtag on social media, #unlearnreligion, to forge change and bring awareness to church abuse. I'm assuming the first order of change they wish to see is repentance in the ICOC, particularly in their home ministry in Boston. Perhaps they want to "make the ICOC great again".
Typically grievances begin this way. We respond to the spiritual abuse that is directly affecting us. Eventually, we realize it's much bigger than the immediate situation. The corruption in the ICOC is systemic. It's worldwide. And it actually isn't even corruption. Corruption means it was uncorrupted in the first place.
As hard it may be to accept, the ICOC was corrupt from the very beginning. If these four guys haven't gone down the rabbithole of ICOC history [and what came before it, i.e. the Stone-Campbell movement], then now is a good time to start.
If they continue this fight against the ICOC powers that be, they will soon find that this is no ordinary religion. These are dark spiritual forces at play. We're moving way past religion, although it is one and an extreme fundamentalist one at that. What we are entering into is CULT territory.
You can learn all the details by clicking here, so I won't go into all the details now, since they know much more than I do about their own situation. All I know is that somehow another ICOC member stole a private journal from at least one or two of these guys [maybe all four] and gave it to the leaders. [They name the specific ICOC Boston [BCOC] leaders who perpetuated this].
Whatever was written in the prayer journals of these brothers, the leaders decided that they needed to be kicked out the church, ASAP. This "sudden disfellowship" was said to transpire in the basement of the brother's house where they were living together as "kingdom roommates". The leader[s] came to the house to tell them they were kicked out.
Anyone who has ever been in the ICOC knows how earth-shattering it is to get expelled from "God's kingdom". The ICOC indoctrinates its members to believe that the ICOC is more than a church-it is the literal "kingdom of God". Membership of the ICOC = membership in the "Book of Life".
In other words, they brainwash members with the idea that whoever is a member of the ICOC on earth will be a member of whoever gets into heaven after they die - or when the so-called rapture happens.
That's how serious it is both spiritually and psychologically. And getting kicked out of the ICOC on earth is supposed to mean one is also being kicked out of heaven.
Also, getting put out of the church locks the door behind you ever getting back in. Typically, when I was a member, people who were kicked out never were allowed back in again.
Anyone not in the ICOC wondering why this is such a big deal, that is why.
I read the open letter [available by clicking here] from the guys to the church and the elders and it reminds me of Henry Kriete's "Honest to God" letter. The constant use of bible scriptures is very telling. These brothers are trying to appeal to people using the bible. They think these ICOC leaders care about bible scriptures. They believe that the ICOC's obsession with the phrase, "the bible is the standard" comes from a place of integrity. They don't realize [yet] that the bible is not what the ICOC tells you about in the Word study. In reality, when it hits the fan, ICOC leaders are not to be rebuked, corrected, or challenged by 'underlings'.
The only way leaders are challenged is by other leaders or elders above them on the food chain. The only time I ever saw a leader confronted was over a scandal that goes public and the leader is "demoted" to save the church's reputation. Or they're being punished for standing up for what is right against other leaders.
However, this is not about the ICOC not obeying the "scriptural approach to resolving conflict" or the "biblical" way to address issues with leadership. It is about control.
I didn't read the prayer journals of these young men, but I'm pretty certain that the leaders who read these journals kicked these four guys out because their private thoughts were in some way threatening the status quo of the church.
When the ICOC wants to get rid of you for no legitimate reason, they hide behind the guise of "causing disunity".
I speculate these journals had written thoughts about the church, specifically about the leadership and criticisms of the ICOC culture.
When the leaders saw these private journals [I'm not EVEN getting into these journals being STOLEN by another ICOC member and given to the leadership behind the men's backs!!], the leaders DIDN'T correct the person who actually stole the journals, they USED the journals as a "smoking gun" to confront AND condemn the brothers as if they were "in hidden sin" and needed to be exposed!
In fact, that's exactly what it is. I know the ICOC. I was there for 11 years. These private journals were seen by the leaders as "hidden sin" against the church. Private thoughts in cults are not allowed-especially when these thoughts and opinions go against the status quo of the church.
The ICOC doesn't care about disfellowshipping people according to the new testament examples. They aren't interested in following the rules they lay out for others. If you're making too much noise, causing too much trouble for leadership, if you're disrupting the status quo, you must be expelled. As I said, usually in the name of "causing factions" or causing "disunity".
These brothers learned the hard way how disposable they are in the eyes of the ICOC. It is the hunger games. Anyone and everyone is disposable if they threaten the church status quo. No one is safe. And no one is truly loved. Or cared about. These four guys found out that everything they sacrificed for the ICOC (time, money, energy, free labor) is all in vain. The ICOC is a giant bloodsucking vampire. When they're done with you, they are done. Whoever you think your friends are in the church, they will distance themselves from you after you are no longer in the church- especially after being so-called disfellowshipped.
This open letter written in 2020 might as well have been written in 2003. The same issues these young men are discussing are the same ones Henry Kriete wrote about. They're the same issues I wrote about. The same issues so many ex-members of the Boston Movement and the Crossroads movement dealt with.
The issues with the ICOC is nothing new. It may be new to Marcus, Justin, Arluah and Manny, but it is as old as the movement itself. That's why I'm so against the rhetoric that the church is new and improved and is no longer how it used to be. New members come in and are indoctrinated during the bible studies to believe there is an "old" ICOC [i.e. we kicked that guy[Kip Mckean] out] and a "current" ICOC.
Both are the same. I will continue to learn more about the situation as it unfolds. The fellas who have been disfellowshipped seem to be doing okay. I wish them the very best and I hope they never return to the ICOC or any organization like it. #Unlearningreligion is great. I hope it evolves to #beyondreligion.
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