City Harvest's founder Kong Hee & 4 others arrested/charged
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My thoughts A:
1)\tThe cases against the famous 5 are criminal in nature. The charges against them alleged that criminal breach of trust, conspiracy to commit criminal breach of trust as an agent and falsification of accounts were committed.
2)\tThe above charges relate to what these agents do with the funds AFTER it was collected from donors. According to COC’s guidelines, there are specific ways to deal with such funds collected. (There is no charge relating to what the agent did to convince the donors to part with the donations).
Some convincing words were said to the donors to convince the donors to part with their funds. These convincing words are not the issues on trial now, but it seems like it is on trial by the public in forums and coffee shops. No court is going to rule on whether “prosperity preaching” is right or wrong at the end, thus, there will be no conclusion to the subject. Forever and ever after, some will agree, some will not. Even the closely related “project crossover” is not going to be debated in Court simply because there is no need to as the case is not about campaigns that the church thinks fit or unfit for Christians.
My thoughts B:
1)\tCOC has issued public statements regarding their investigations since 2010. CAD also issued theirs and went on to press charges against the famous 5.
2)\tCHC responded by issuing statements that seems to address the charges directly, claiming no fault has been committed.
3)\tKH went on to tell his congregation that he maintained his integrity in the face of allegations.
Although the various statements issued by all the parties above seem to be at odd with each other, there is a possibility that all of them are talking about different things. COC and CAD are talking about mismanagement and administrations of charities’ funds. CHC and KH could be talking about their duty to God and their campaigns for Christianity. COC and CAD is talking about how you transfer funds from point A to B and back to point A and CHC’s statement could be implying that the money is still back at point A, no harm done.
My thoughts
1)\tBecause this case is related to the church, inevitably the attention is turned to the beliefs, teachings and comparisons are made. The truth is, these comparisons have been ongoing except that it is probably not made public before but is made louder at times like this. I am not sure is this the best time for people to ride on the famous 5’s unfortunate situations to discuss and relate to their unfortunate case and talk/discuss about these comparisons…
2)\tSome are expecting more juicy information to come out of these charges against the famous 5, but the truth is, there may not be any more information that needs to be spoken about if the famous 5 just plead guilty and mitigate their case. Once they plead guilty, there will be no trial thus no new information needed to be produced in court. Instead, sentences are meted out and the story ends there.
3)\tI cannot help but think about KH’s young son and wonder what will happen to him if Dad is convicted and jailed for a long time. But at the same time, I also cannot help thinking about how donors’ hard earned sincere contributions are abused for the sake of one person. Justice is really a tough business.
SH -
kiddo:
csc ,csc:
The more I listen to KH, the angrier I become.
Ridiculous theory and total disregard for the Word of God.
:frustrated:
\"mai angry\" , \"mai angry\".....
everywhere got 'buaya de\" even
in religion which deals with the matter of the heart....
:hugs: :hi5:
This funny video by Jim Carey , will cool you down....enjoy...
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_KjlhfSfsE][/youtube]
:rotflmao: :rotflmao: :rotflmao:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2xXXSFE-NU][/youtube] -
empressplace:
This is why preachers such as Kong Hee could continue to preach and grow his flock despite his erroneous teachings. Prior to this case, it seems very few local preachers/leaders are willing to comment on Kong Hee and Sun Ho. If only there had been a concerted effort by local church leaders to rebuke Sun Ho's MTVs and Kong Hee's prosperity teaching, Singapore's Christian landscape could have been very different. I hope this is not because \"my church is smaller, so I don't think I have the right to criticize a bigger church\" mentality.Dreamaurora:
Yes, I don't think church leaders should comment on the case or whether Kong Hee is guilty or not. But they could have engagad on related issues that are raised from this case, such as proper Christian public image (Sun Ho's MTVs) or prosperity teaching.
KH's teachings and Sun Ho's public image issues have been around for years. If they are worthy of comment, then they should be commented on whether there was a criminal case before the courts or not. In other words, the other Christian leaders should not need to wait till today if they find it necessary to criticise a leader of a very popular church in public. If they only do so today, then it begs the question of why they did not do so earlier. Does it require a criminal case to criticise teachings?
So to the contrary, I think Christian leaders may only be able to comment on the court course after the matter has come to a conclusion and may find it hard to go on to comment on KH's teachings or Sun Ho's music career.
In fact, Lawrence Khong of FCBC spoke in support of KH:
\"We must stand ever more united in love and stronger in prayer for Pastor Kong Hee and the church. This is a time of testing for the Body of Christ. We are all on trial before a righteous God, and we must ask ourselves: do we truly love the Body?\"
http://www.fcbc.org.sg/fcbc/en/celebration/our-thoughts-this-week
Not sure, though, why they are \"all on trial before a righteous God\" when it is just the few individuals who are charged in court?!
Yes, those issues should have been commented much earlier and not only because of this criminal case. But now this case is out in the open and people are asking and getting confused, should Christian leaders here just sit on the fence? -
[quote=\"TheBluePapa}]
http://www.fightingforthefaith.com/2012/06/ed-youngs-calvinist-melt-down.html
Listen from 16.00 to 23.00.[/quote]
Did Kong Hee really say that God apologized to him?
[/quote]
God apologized to Kong Hee ? Now I've heard it all..... :nunchuk:[/quote]
Yes. Listen to the audio from 16 minutes onwards. -
Dear Bro Dream,
I have a question to ask. Is there an authority in this world that deals with the behavior of churches all around the world? I mean, for example, if a preacher is going astray with his teachings, teaching nonsense to people and somehow a large group believe in him and follow him, is there a world organisation somewhere that people can complain to and they will send someone to investigate and look into the issues?
From the way I look at it, if such thing do happen, it would be so sensitive for the government and I doubt they can stand in to judge on matters regarding religions…
SH -
SilentHermit:
No, though I do wish there is one such body. For denominations here such as methodist there is a board that ensures all the pastors do not stray from the accepted methodist teaching and spout nonsense. It is by no means a perfect system, but at least there are checks and balances in place.Dear Bro Dream,
I have a question to ask. Is there an authority in this world that deals with the behavior of churches all around the world? I mean, for example, if a preacher is going astray with his teachings, teaching nonsense to people and somehow a large group believe in him and follow him, is there a world organisation somewhere that people can complain to and they will send someone to investigate and look into the issues?
From the way I look at it, if such thing do happen, it would be so sensitive for the government and I doubt they can stand in to judge on matters regarding religions..
SH
The problem with policing churched is that often the ones with the questionable teaching are the larger and richer ones. They can always claim they are doing the right thing since people are flocking to their churches. Their size and wealth could also mean they are willing to use legal power to defend their teachings.
So yes, unfortunately it is up to a christian to discover his own faith and to decipher the true essence of Christianity and the Word. Only then he can deduce what is right or wrong. -
Dreamaurora:
I feel that the best solution is through education and raising the quality of the people. Ultimately, if the collective wisdom of the society is low, such a \"policing\" bodies will not be possible. the fact that rich people and many people are willing to follow questionable teachings reflect that there is a declining collective wisdom such as the \"right\" teaching fear the \"false\" one and is too afraid to speak up.
No, though I do wish there is one such body. For denominations here such as methodist there is a board that ensures all the pastors do not stray from the accepted methodist teaching and spout nonsense. It is by no means a perfect system, but at least there are checks and balances in place.SilentHermit:
Dear Bro Dream,
I have a question to ask. Is there an authority in this world that deals with the behavior of churches all around the world? I mean, for example, if a preacher is going astray with his teachings, teaching nonsense to people and somehow a large group believe in him and follow him, is there a world organisation somewhere that people can complain to and they will send someone to investigate and look into the issues?
From the way I look at it, if such thing do happen, it would be so sensitive for the government and I doubt they can stand in to judge on matters regarding religions..
SH
The problem with policing churched is that often the ones with the questionable teaching are the larger and richer ones. They can always claim they are doing the right thing since people are flocking to their churches. Their size and wealth could also mean they are willing to use legal power to defend their teachings.
So yes, unfortunately it is up to a christian to discover his own faith and to decipher the true essence of Christianity and the Word. Only then he can deduce what is right or wrong. -
Dreamaurora:
No, though I do wish there is one such body. For denominations here such as methodist there is a board that ensures all the pastors do not stray from the accepted methodist teaching and spout nonsense. It is by no means a perfect system, but at least there are checks and balances in place.SilentHermit:
Dear Bro Dream,
I have a question to ask. Is there an authority in this world that deals with the behavior of churches all around the world? I mean, for example, if a preacher is going astray with his teachings, teaching nonsense to people and somehow a large group believe in him and follow him, is there a world organisation somewhere that people can complain to and they will send someone to investigate and look into the issues?
From the way I look at it, if such thing do happen, it would be so sensitive for the government and I doubt they can stand in to judge on matters regarding religions..
SH
The problem with policing churched is that often the ones with the questionable teaching are the larger and richer ones. They can always claim they are doing the right thing since people are flocking to their churches. Their size and wealth could also mean they are willing to use legal power to defend their teachings.
So yes, unfortunately it is up to a christian to discover his own faith and to decipher the true essence of Christianity and the Word. Only then he can deduce what is right or wrong.
Like dat siao liao.. -
SilentHermit:
Not really...although there is no authority to step in, the mainstrean churches like Anglican, Methodist, Prebyterian can always issue their own statements to disapprove of any act. but then, sometimes on certain issues, the regional authority (eg anglican in SEasia) may defy the central authority (authority in England).
Like dat siao liao.. -
SilentHermit:
Oh, thanks SilentHermit, you've just expressed what's on my mind!...Is there an authority in this world that deals with the behavior of churches all around the world? I mean, for example, if a preacher is going astray with his teachings, teaching nonsense to people and somehow a large group believe in him and follow him, is there a world organisation somewhere that people can complain to and they will send someone to investigate and look into the issues?
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