Nutty cult: Aggressive Christianity Missions Training Corps

[Strelnikov]

I first heard of these guys on Donna Kossy's defunct Kooks Museum website years ago and I thought they were gone, but nope, they are still out there. Pretty much that is what happens when long-time Salvation Army members decide to go off on their own - they start wearing Army-Navy Store military surplus uniforms, boasting field-grade ranks, and wearing said uniforms while ranting about rock music in the Fundamentalist Christian "tradition."



The man above is "Brigadier General" James Green, who co-founded the organization with his wife "Brigadier General" Lila (now Deborah) Green in the early 1980s. Like a budget Italian horror movie, the group has multiple titles: "Holy Tribal Nation", the "Free Love Ministries", and the "Life Force Team" because of their complicated intensely stupid legal battles as Aggressive Christianity Missions Training Corps. They have or had missions in India, the Philippines, Nepal, Nigeria, Zimbabwe and Malawi and their website has photos of their converts in these countries wearing military-style uniforms. And like too many Funadmentalist churches, right now the group is under investigation for child molestation and child abuse.

Some of the stunts they pulled in the 1980s:

....the Greens then embarked on the fundamentalist warpath, and by 1981 had established Free Love Ministries in Sacramento, which, according to Schmierer, began as an "orthodox christian" ministry. But both Lila and Jim are natural extremists, as evidenced by their descents to the depths of rock 'n' roll depravity. Over the years, [former member Maura] Schmierer laments, their teachings became more and more radical, and eventually, Lila began to claim that she was God's number one prophet. Religious services included Lila's sermons and prophecies, chanting, writhing on the floor, and speaking in tongues.

According to one Sacramento resident, the ACMTC maintained a "very high profile." They appeared in public in Marine style clothing with a golden winged logo on their jackets; all members donned short hair, polished shoes and exhibited a "general lack of emotion." Their show on a Sacramento christian radio station, KFIA, regularly warned listeners to brace for war against Satanic forces responsible for such modern scourges as homosexuality, psychoanalysis, fornication, rock 'n' roll and pride. ACMTC's fanaticism was apparently too much for the station, and they removed ACMTC from their airwaves in 1984. By this time, not only their christian brethren but also their neighbors had begun to worry about ACMTC's activities.

In 1985 the El Dorado County sheriff's office investigated ACMTC in response to neighbors' accusations that ACMTC had been conducting armed war games in the desert. However, no weapons were found on ACMTC property. In response to the accusations, Jim Green protested, "we're nothing but a missionary training group. The only military operation out there is running and jogging."

Indeed, ACMTC literature makes it clear that, at least officially, ACMTC is concerned with spiritual, not bodily warfare; firearms are uncategorically prohibited from ACMTC grounds. But the literature also makes it clear that they are deadly serious about the DEVIL, and that they consider mainstream christians to be not only wimps, but also dupes of Satan, who "don't even know that there's a war going on."

They think that being a Christian is smiling, touching one another in love, chatting, having social parties together, hearing nice little sermons, raising nice little families. That is superficial! ... I call it "Churchianity"* because that is what it is, it's not real! True Christians are going to have to fight the devil, and they are going to have to know the Lord, and they are going to have to come under command. ...

JESUS CHRIST DIED TO REDEEM MANKIND FROM THE CAPTIVITY OF SATAN, NOT TO MAKE FALSE PEACE WITH THE DEVIL AND CALL HIM BROTHER.

Normal christians have been duped by the Devil into thinking of Jesus as a wimp, when in fact he is a fierce warrior, with a military title. According to scripture, Hebrews 2, to be exact, Jesus is the "captain" of the salvation of many sons. When Captain Jesus said "blessed are the meek," he wasn't talking about wimps:

There is a misconception being preached based on Matthew 5:5, "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth." The misconception in modernism or "modern" Christianity is the portrayal of God's people as soft, meek, passive, and compromising Christians. Let me point out to you that "meek" doesn't mean "weak." Jesus Christ, our captain, doesn't want His soldiers to be weak, soft, or soggy, but rather strong in the Lord and the power of His might (Eph. 6:10). Meekness is a quality of having strength under control, being calm and confident when there is a battle being fought around you. ...

With Jesus Christ as their official "Commander-in-Chief," ACMTC was keenly aware of the battle being fought around them. Their war with the Devil heated up in early 1988, when Maura Schmierer filed a lawsuit against Free Love Ministries, asking for $20 million in damages. Schmierer had escaped from a small shed at the ACMTC compound the previous year. She claimed that the Greens had accused her of loving her husband more than God, brainwashed her, changed her name to "Forsaken," and then forced her and another brainwashed member to stay in a 5 x12 foot wooden shed for ten weeks, their only nourishment consisting of tiny peanut butter sandwiches. Schmierer's 5-year-old son's name was also changed--to "Demon"--when the Greens accused him of being possessed.

For the Greens, Schmierer's lawsuit, among other conflicts, was just further evidence of their constant battle with Satan. In a personal letter to a correspondent--a few months after the lawsuit was filed--they wrote, "Please be aware that the message that we preach is one that Satan hates, and if you step forward into spreading the message to others you are asking for a big fight with the devil. The messages are anointed and they set people free through the power of the Holy Spirit, so be prepared to fight if you start distributing the army message." They knew this all too well from experience.

The Greens were used to this kind of warfare, and it seemed as though the lawsuit didn't faze them; they never even showed up in court. However, late in 1988, the Greens must have begun to worry, because Lila got word from God that Schmierer's lawyer, Bob Blasier would soon be run over by a truck. When that prophecy didn't pan out, she predicted that he would be struck down by God's wrath. When that prophecy didn't pan out either, the Greens were in serious trouble.

In 1989, the court ordered ACMTC to pay Schmierer $1.2 million; they had lost the lawsuit by default. Not too surprisingly they didn't come up with the money, so Blasier had their compound seized by the court. When an attempt was made to assess its value, however, Free Love Ministries had vacated the premises, which was found to be in ruins. They had apparently demolished the Sacramento compound shortly before fleeing to one of their missions in Mozambique, though the Greens deny this. Neighbors, however had observed them tearing down parts of the buildings, and loading them into vans.

ACMTC attempted to set up new headquarters in Butte County, about 80 miles north of Sacramento, but Blasier was hot on their trail, and had a lien put on their new property, as well. Around this time, in a letter to another correspondent, they explained that they had been forced to close their doors because of "extreme persecution." Though they might give in to a judge, they'd never stop fighting Satan. "We're busier than ever. Our work has tripled because of persecution!"

Free Love Ministries was on the run, but finally settled in Klamath Falls, Oregon, only 3 months after they had set up in Butte County. But by then, ACMTC had dwindled to only about 19 people.

As of 1992, the Greens would appear to be back in full force, focusing their printed attacks on abortion, homosexual rights, animal rights, rap music and christian rock. Lila now signs her articles, "Deborah L. Green," and ACMTC now calls itself by yet another name, the "Life Force Team."

- Donna Kossy, excerpting her book Kooks: A Guide to the Outer Limits of Human Belief in 1995.

_____________________________

* "Churchianity" is a term I heard in my nutball IFB private schools, and it goes way back:

Churchianity (uncountable)

(pejorative) Any practices of Christianity that are viewed as placing a larger emphasis on the habits of church life or the institutional traditions of the church than on theology and spiritual teachings of Jesus; the quality of being too church-focused.

1789, Samuel Parr, John Johnstone, editor, The works of Samuel Parr, ...: With memoirs of his life and writings, and a selection from his correspondence, volume 1, published 1828, page 341:

In October, 1789 (says Dr. Parr in the Sequel, p.99), when I preached for the Charity Schools at Birmingham, I earnestly recommended to the audience two admirable sermons which Dr. Priestley had written, &c. &c. / This commendation gave great offence; the name of the arch-heritic was poison to the orthodox ears of many of the congregation. One of them in the vestry, immediately after the sermon, ventured even to expostulate with the preacher; and to represent to him that the sermon recommended might he admirable and good Christian doctrine, but that the author was an enemy to the Church, and therefore ought never to be named within its sacred precincts. Parr heard him out, and then calmly replied, "Sir, you are the best vindicator of Churchianity I ever knew."

1852, Edwin Paxton Hood, Lamps of the temple: shadows from the lights of the modern pulpit, page 329:

Such religion is Churchianity; it is not Christianity. Christianity means the religion where Christ is all; Churchianity, the religion where the Church is all....

2002, Charles Jenkins, Keeping Sane in a Crazy World, page 84:

The Priest and Levite represent Churchly Movements, They represented Churchianity that is powerless to lift suffering humanity. What is wrong with the world today is that we have too much Churchianity and too little Christianity.

Above stolen from here.

[Kumioko]

I wonder if these nuts edit Wikipedia and if so what articles.

[Strelnikov]

I wonder if these nuts edit Wikipedia and if so what articles.

Well, they either don't edit the page on their own organization or were stopped from editing it.

[Flip Flopped]

I haven't seen spiritual warfare against psychoanalysis in quite some time. Doesn't resonate anymore.

[Strelnikov]

I haven't seen spiritual warfare against psychoanalysis in quite some time. Doesn't resonate anymore.

They don't like psychotherapy because 9 times out of 10, the therapist will talk about how emotionally abusive (Fundy/Evangelical/ whatever cult variation of Fundamentalism or Evangelicalism) Christianity the patient is part of, and the pastors/preachers/religious writers are scared that members will be de-converted through talk therapy and possibly some mood-stabilizing drugs. So they make it seem awful to the flock, though not as crazily as Scientology with their "Industry of Death" exhibit at the CCHR building in Los Angeles. Though this Christian college textbook chapter helps build that wall between being a good Fundy and a normal human being very nicely.

[Flip Flopped]

I haven't seen spiritual warfare against psychoanalysis in quite some time. Doesn't resonate anymore.

They don't like psychotherapy because 9 times out of 10, the therapist will talk about how emotionally abusive (Fundy/Evangelical/ whatever cult variation of Fundamentalism or Evangelicalism) Christianity the patient is part of, and the pastors/preachers/religious writers are scared that members will be de-converted through talk therapy and possibly some mood-stabilizing drugs. So they make it seem awful to the flock, though not as crazily as Scientology with their "Industry of Death" exhibit at the CCHR building in Los Angeles. Though this Christian college textbook chapter helps build that wall between being a good Fundy and a normal human being very nicely.

Have you looked at any of the Christian therapies that have been trendy? "The Walk with Christ" might be the name of one that was popular about ten years ago.

[ericbarbour]

Some of the stunts they pulled in the 1980s:

The Reagan years were the actual beginning of today's manic alt-right and religious extremism. You can't really blame it all on the Internet, as Salon.com tried to claim today.

And I might add that the ACMTC is still regarded as a big, pathetic joke by people in Sacramento. Apparently they were kicked out of Klamath Falls and wound up on a worthless piece of desert land in New Mexico. Like many other crank cults.

I wonder if these nuts edit Wikipedia and if so what articles.

The first version of their article from 2007 was very damn hostile.
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... =154433927

An IP address expanded it tremendously (and made it more positive) in 2012.
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... =464680100

A small editwar and the "advertisement" tag resulted. Even though the current article is still quite negative, someone is watching it. But the main "action" was in 2010-2013 and most of the combatants have not returned to WP.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Benbullen
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... /Eldamorie
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... s/Jorasmom

[Flip Flopped]

In the early to mid-1980s the fundies were still reluctant to discuss homeschooling. Around ten years later was the beginning of quiverfull being openly discussed.

[Strelnikov]

In the early to mid-1980s the fundies were still reluctant to discuss homeschooling. Around ten years later was the beginning of quiverfull being openly discussed.

I remember first hearing about homeschooling the day my class came back from a trip up north to a Christian School "contest week" during the latter part of the Reagan Administration and all I could think was "They can be dorkier than this?" And you have to know that at that point I was half-convinced most of the members of that place were ex-cultists.

[Flip Flopped]

In the early to mid-1980s the fundies were still reluctant to discuss homeschooling. Around ten years later was the beginning of quiverfull being openly discussed.

I remember first hearing about homeschooling the day my class came back from a trip up north to a Christian School "contest week" during the latter part of the Reagan Administration and all I could think was "They can be dorkier than this?" And you have to know that at that point I was half-convinced most of the members of that place were ex-cultists.

Having visited a homeschooling home around that time, I'm left wondering why they felt the need to put a tablecloth over the television. I understand they didn't want to promote watching it, but was it so unseemly that it needed to be covered?