Chapter Four: Grace Gospel Church - Its beliefs, practices and opponents
4.5 Opposition to CTMI/GGC
4.5.1 Growing concerns about “broken families”
By 2008 several parents of young members of CTMI/GGC had become concerned about strikingly similar behavioural changes noted in their children. These children were young adults ranging in age from 17 to 21 who had become preoccupied with GGC and its activities.
Parents witnessed a seemingly sudden change in their children, manifest in a desire to attend several GGC meetings a week, a desire to help build CTMI’s new building in Trianon, Mauritius, and attend youth camps in Mauritius or Zimbabwe. This preoccupation resulted in the neglect of long-standing friendships and social commitments, encouraged by the CTMI/GGC teaching that these relationships were
“carnal”, of “the flesh”, and should be willingly sacrificed in favour of “spiritual”
relationships, with members of GGC or CTMI. Such sacrifices indicate a “given life”, that is a life submitted to the revelation of the cross. Young people expressed the desire to abandon studies and/or employment, and go to Mauritius to live and learn from other
“given” lives.
The following report provides examples of this trend:
312Stephan P. Pretorius, 2007. “Seemingly Harmless New Christian Religious Movements in South Africa Pose Serious Threats of Spiritual Abuse,” HTS Theological Studies 63. pp. 266-267.
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Steve and Heather Goddard, of Kloof, say their daughter, who they did not wish to name, has been a member of the church for almost three years and started avoiding her other Christian friends “in favour of members of Grace Gospel”.
Anthony and Romaine Chaplin, of Durban North, say their son had been a top pupil at Kearsney College before going to study at the University of Cape Town.
Last April, he abandoned his studies to go to Mauritius.313
Parents also became concerned about the smothering attention and expressions of love their children received from other members of GGC. It was not uncommon for members to receive in excess of 40 sms’s per day from members of GGC. New members began to spend more and more time in this environment, wanting to attend four meetings during the week where they experienced a repetitive style of worship and the sharing of personal testimonies.
This affection and attention served to reinforce the “superiority” of the spiritual over the biological family. In even the most loving families it is impossible to give the amount of attention and care to an individual that GGC is reported to have offered, which may be an indictment of the sincerity of the church rather than that of the average family.
The young people also began to use expressions and jargon unfamiliar even to parents who were Christians. Examples include, “the given life”; “follow your heart”; “in the natural”; “in the flesh”; “that’s emotional”; “putting law”; “well with Jesus”; “love you guys”; “shared the pure gospel”; “identify with the cross”; "this gospel"; "twisted hearts"; "putting hands into"; "veiled hearts"; "lies and persecution"; "broken lives on the altar"; "we were orphans now we have a father".314
Most of this language is copied from the discourse of Audrey and Miki Hardy. Further changes in discourse include stilted syntax where people attempt to talk in the style of St Paul’s writings and/or phrases parroted from sermons of Hardy’s. Some young people even began to speak with a French Mauritian accent. This change of discourse to
313Victoria John, Christian Cult stole our kids, say parents, (IOL News, 07/11/2009),
http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=139&art_id=vn20091107072434816C446171 (Accessed 14/07/12)
314 Posted by “Keith B” (07/10/11). http://ctmiconcernedparents.com/phpBB- 3.0.5/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=179. (Accessed 15/02/12)
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have been a common experience among parents: “We have all heard our children expressing identical views - even using the same language. This even applies to folks who write to us from other countries.”315
A further development witnessed by parents was an unusual emotional modulation. This was either manifest in “Pollyanna” type positivity and/or an emotional callousness and indifference to the suffering GGC members were causing to their families. Emotions such as sorrow, anguish, anger, grief or hurt were regarded by young people as emotions “of the flesh” - that is, emotions that needed to be crucified. This created a situation where the natural emotions raised precisely by the individual’s growing separation from family, friends and normal life were minimised or dismissed instead of being seen as warnings. Through the scrupulous attempts to have a “pure heart”, individuals in GGC were encouraged to spend great effort repressing these emotions which leads to the characteristic “robotic” and inappropriate emotional responses to life.
Such changes in discourse and emotion naturally created further alienation and concern in parents about the influence of GGC over their children. Individual meetings between concerned parents and O’Connell-Jones occurred and he reassured parents that what they were witnessing were the changed lives of those who had embraced “the gospel of the cross”. He offered comparisons with young people who were leading debauched and worldly lives and told them to let their children "follow their hearts". Parents, especially those without a Christian background, left these meetings somewhat mollified.
In several cases, the relationship between the member of GGC and their parents, and also with their wider family (siblings, grandparents, uncles and aunts, cousins) became so strained as a result of the GGC inspired behavioural changes, that the relationship was in danger of complete breakdown. Some parents became more strident in their concerns and O’Connell-Jones and GGC began to accuse these parents of persecuting the church. Challenges to the “given life” were interpreted as worldly, if not satanic, persecution and scripture passages such as St Matthew 10:34-37 and 12:46-50, were
315 Posted by “Pilgrim” (27/03/12). http://ctmiconcernedparents.com/phpBB- 3.0.5/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=1379. (Accessed 01/08/12)
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cited to “prove” that the “true gospel” had the potential to divide families. This naturally did nothing to allay parent’s fears and thus concern about GGC escalated.
Community concern about GGC and CTMI can perhaps be gauged by the interest express by local media. “The Highway Mail” published by Caxton and CTP Printers and Publishers Ltd, 316 is a community newspaper distributed to around 50 000 readers in the outer West area of Durban, into which Pinetown falls. On 31st March 2010 an article on CTMI and GGC entitled “Son’s Cult Link, parents call in CIA” was published (author unknown).317 Prior to this, on the 8th of February 2010, East Coast Radio, a commercial radio station in KwaZulu-Natal with a listening audience of just under 2 million people318 interviewed Howard Silk and Keith Brown about their experiences of CTMI and GGC.319
It is possible that a meeting held on the 5th August 2008 marked the beginning of the end of dialogue between GGC and those concerned with its practices. The meeting occurred between the Reverend Clint Archer, the Pastor of Hillcrest Baptist Church and Keith Brown, an Elder of the same congregation; and O’Connell-Jones, and Neville Fitzroy and Selby Mpofu who are Deacons in GGC. The primary point of discussion was the unexpected “desertion” of a Hillcrest Baptist Sunday School teacher, Rachel Gillon, to GGC. The meeting was marked by Archer and Brown attempting to understand what had prompted or influenced this Sunday School teacher to suddenly become judgmental about Hillcrest Baptist Church and to abandon her church in favour of GGC, and O’Connell-Jones’ defensive and often bellicose attempts to avoid responsibility for the teacher’s behaviour.320
316 http://highwaymail.co.za/about-us/ (Accessed 13/03/2013)
317http://ctmiconcernedparents.com/phpBB-
3.0.5/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=241&p=1342&hilit=highway#p1342 (Accessed 12/03/2013)
318 www.ecr.co.za (Accessed 13/03/2013)
319 http://ctmiconcernedparents.com/phpBB-3.0.5/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=196 (Accessed 02/12/2012)
320 See Letter to CTMI Deacon over Watershed Meeting, http://ctmiconcernedparents.com/phpBB- 3.0.5/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=215 (Accessed 05/10/12)
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Brown later came to hear that Mpofu (one of the GGC Deacons at the meeting) was portraying a significantly different account of this meeting and thus Brown wrote to him on the 12th October 2010 providing a transcript of the meeting and requesting that he either challenge or accept this version of what had transpired. This letter was ignored.321
In December 2008, I was approached in my professional capacity as an accredited Pastoral Therapist of the South African Association for Pastoral Work, by a number of parents who were concerned about the behavioural changes of their children since they joined GGC. I soon became aware that the distinctive beliefs, commitment of members to the group and the group’s relationship to the wider Church and society represented a unique phenomenon. I noted the following:
An increasing involvement in the life of Grace Gospel Church to the detriment and exclusion of previously held hobbies, commitments, friends and ultimately of the individual’s family;
A dramatic change in study and career plans;
A loss of independent and critical reasoning;
Uncharacteristically stilted conversation heavily dependent on church jargon and discourse;
A flattened and artificial affect: i.e. non-spontaneous “robotic” emotional responses;
Growing arrogance and judgmental attitudes towards people outside of their church to the extent of paranoia;
Growing deceitfulness;
Increasing aggression in response to being challenged about the church;
An obsessive conviction to move to CTMI’s [then] building project in Trianon, Mauritius.322
321 http://ctmiconcernedparents.com/phpBB-3.0.5/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=215 (Accessed 07/04/2012)
322 Extract from a letter dated 29/01/2009, composed by S.A.J. Semple, and used widely by the
Concerned Parents Group to warn the community about Grace Gospel Church. One of three letters from Semple posted on the CPG website: http:/ctmiconcernedparents.com on 31/10/09. (Accessed 25/10/2011)
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Steve and Heather Goddard wrote to Miki Hardy on the 2nd February 2009 to express their deep concern about the wedge that GGC was driving between them and their daughter, Hayley. They specified her radical change of study plans, an email they had discovered in which she pledged total submission to Miki Hardy, Hardy's instruction to Hayley to not let her parents influence her and the advice she had received from GGC members to take out a restraining order against her parents.323 Hardy responded the following day with a brief, dismissive email disclaiming any wrong doing and inviting them to visit Mauritius to see how CTMI operates.324
The estrangement between the terminally ill Stuart Brown and his family has been described above.
The indifferent or defiant responses of GGC and CTMI to concerns and criticisms levelled at them from the community, made concerned parties realise that collective action would potentially be the only way in which to deal with these groups.