Press F5 repeatedly on this link for The CORE. As one movie character said, "Seven years of higher education down the drain."
One comic bit involves making fun of the sermon, putting duct tape around his head to illustrate how "your pastor's sermons are too long." The suggestion is that Ski will amuse and entertain by continuing to disparage the Means of Grace. That is classic Church Growth Dreck* from the Cloaca Maxima* - Fuller Seminary.
The church is in the news because the bankrupt theatre remains a local scandal. Lots of alternative churches already exist in the Appleton area. People are sorry the theatre flopped and left the city and the bank holding the bag.
The theatre leased by Ski went bankrupt with over $4 million in debt. It is enormous. How can Ski afford the lights, let along the associated costs, like the lease itself?
He has an executive assistant? Two salaries? How about that, mission pastors? Remember cranking out the newsletter, setting up the chairs, having wifey play hostess? We were all suckers. We needed some rich dudes and juicy grants for all the luxuries.
Some local rich guys have ponied up the money for this experiment. My guess is that they are the people trying to make Church and Change continue as the management of WELS. As another rich guy said in starting a Church Growth experiment in a different town: I will show them how to do it.
So if you wonder why worthwhile causes are being neglected - The CORE is the reason.
But, self-centered spending is not limited to the Wi-Fi, coffee, IMAX theatre school of evangelism. Fox Valley High spent $18 million on their new campus, with a big emphasis on sports facilities. St. Mark Depere also tried monumental building, but failed at that, in spite of their denials.
Mega-spending on buildings is an evangelism tool, according to some pastors and Robert Schuller.
Mrs. Ichabod just said, "Didn't he just fire his son at Garden Grove?"
Now I remember. Robert Schuller fired his son, who quit the church altogether. His empire is coming undone. Nice building, though. It reminds me of the Great Pyramid of Egypt, a proper tomb for a Pharaoh.
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*Vocabulary List
Dreck is German for... Let's move to the next word.
The Cloaca Maxima was the great sewer in the ancient City of Rome.
Earlier I confused this:
with this:
Cloaca Magna Avium: The Specialist on Guano
