(Saddleback press release, “Rick and Kay Warren Challenge Church Leaders to Play a More Vital Role in the Global AIDS Response By Leveraging Their Unique Resources,” Monday August 14, 10:31 am ET.) [emphasis added]
This press release about AIDS was issued on the final leg of Dr. Richard Warren’s 35-day journey international tour. We already know Warren’s ethics because he described it when launching his 2nd Reformation over a year ago — “whatever it takes.” How to put legs on this new pragmatism is spelled out in the remainder of the press release:
“In her workshop, Kay Warren further challenged that there needs to be an integrated effort between governments, business/NGOs and the church in order to keep AIDS from galloping into the next generation…. ‘[W]e need to respond to this crisis on all fronts with everyone doing their part — at times working in groups with which you may not agree….'”
“In that context, the Warrens said they are pressing for a “coalition of civility,” where diverse groups can disagree without being disagreeable or denouncing one another, and seek unity without requiring uniformity in order to reach critical mass in the response to HIV/AIDS.
“Dr. Warren emphasized that the Church brings several distinctives to the table that neither governments nor business/NGO organizations will ever have, including the largest distribution network; the biggest pool of volunteers… local credibility, the longest record of caring …; moral authority to carry out its mission; and the power of God. ‘I make no apology that the Church can lead the way in the name of Jesus Christ,’ he said.
“Dr. Warren also … said there are six ways that every church …can get involved in caring for people infected and affected by HIV/AIDS. These can be summarized in the acronym C.H.U.R.C.H.: Care for and comfort the sick; Handle testing and counseling; Unleash a volunteer labor force; Remove the stigma; Champion healthy behavior; and Help with nutrition and medications.” [emphases added]
Collaboration — the “integrated effort between governments, business/NGOs and the church” — is not a new idea. It is an idea that has been propagated relentlessly by the international think tanks and foundations since the latter half of the 1980s. The public documents were often accompanied by diagrams showing spikes on the hub of a wheel, with each area of society attached to a central governing structure.
History already shows us the ill effects of collaboration, particularly in Africa. Readers may recall The Constant Gardener, which uncovered the collaboration of pharmaceutical companies and governments. Or, Hotel Rwanda with its international collaborative failures. Or, the BBC production Rhodes, which depicted the horrifying results that can happen when missionaries collaborate with corporate and government interests. The point in bringing up these examples is that ethics dissolved into mush because of the competing interests of collaboration. We are apparently supposed to believe that man’s nature has somehow changed, and that he is now endued with supreme good (particularly intentions) that will outweigh or overcome any bad.
In Rick Warren’s world, the church plays a pivotal role in this collaboration — uniquely positioned as a “distribution network” for — what? What precisely will the church be delivering in collaboration with these NGOs, corporations, and governments? Will it be the saving Gospel message of Jesus Christ? The C.H.U.R.C.H. acronym doesn’t include a “G” for Gospel.
We do have a few clues. There is pertinent history to this entire P.E.A.C.E. Plan going back over a half century. It is entirely possible that Dr. Richard Warren is the first man uniquely poised to ever accomplish the goals and dreams first articulated by one of the leading internationalists of all time — John Foster Dulles. (See previous Herescope posts.)
In 1942 Dulles described the PURPOSE of the churches, which was seen as an obligation “to fulfill the objectives of progressive internationalism which in the end would bring God’s kingdom to this earth.” To this end Dulles proposed a “moral law” which could effect “peaceful change.” The Federal Council Bulletin [FCC] reporting on the “National Study Conference on the Churches and a Just and Durable Peace,” chaired by Dulles and held at Delaware, Ohio, stated the dominionist aim that:
“…[A] supreme responsibility rests upon the church of Christ; Christians should, as citizens, seek to translate their beliefs into realities; they must seek that the Kingdom of the world become the Kingdom of Christ.” [emphasis added]
The Commission on a Just and Durable Peace issued thirteen principles for peace at this conference.
“Principle One proclaims that there was, in fact, a ‘moral law’ that ‘undergirds the world’. According to Principle Two, ‘the sickness and suffering which afflict our present society are proof of indifference to, as well as direct violation of, the moral law.’ Furthermore, ‘all share in responsibility for the present evils.‘” [emphasis added]
A national public relations campaign was then launched with the funding assistance of the Rockefeller Foundation of New York. In October, 1942 the Commission published a booklet entitled A Righteous Faith for A Just and Durable Peace as part of this process. Points 3, 4, 5 and 6 are particularly relevant to today’s discussion:
“(3) The ecumenical (world-wide) character of the Church enables it and its members to make a unique contribution toward world order. (4) Christian motivation supplies an essential prerequisite to effective action; (5) Christians must seek the cooperation of other faiths; (6) the churches do not have primary responsibility to devise the details of world order. But they must proclaim the enduring moral principles by which human plans are constantly to be tested.” [emphasis added]
Obviously, the plan to use the church to help create a new world order is not a new plan. In fact, the methods to manipulate the church into action are remarkably similar —
1) develop a common moral ethic,
2) create a synthesis of faiths
3) implement a collaboration of interests,
4) undertake a massive propaganda campaign,
5) invoke the ideal of global “peace,”
6) emotively appeal to “higher” causes, such as eliminating sickness and suffering,
7) develop a sense of guilt or responsibility to motivate action,
8) use the Scriptures as a way to shore up the purpose or the process.
[The quotations above are gleaned from Building the Kingdom of God on Earth: The Chruches’ Contribution to Marshal Public Support for World Order and Peace, 1919-1945, by Dr. Martin Erdmann (Wipf & Stock, 2005), pp. 242-248).]
The Truth:
“They have healed also the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.” (Jeremiah 6:14)
Commenting on this verse, Matthew Poole’s Commentary (Hendrickson) states:
“[H]ere the prophet shows wherein their false dealing consists, viz. in daubing over their misery and danger that was coming on them, by persuading them that it should not come, or if it did, it would be easily cured; as some physicians do with their patients, that make light of a wound, and so neglect the true method of cure;…”