Child abuse in the assemblies

[David Mauldin]

Ed it was going on Sundays!  Worship started at 9:30 and was over at 12:15-30 back at 3:00 to 5:00 for Bible study  "Head Down No Fuss!"

[editor]

Hi Ed,

Yes, we all did this.  It was called mat-training and no-fussing.  

The idea was that you were unfaithful if you kids kept you busy in the meeting and God did not get the worship that was due Him.  If you were diligent to train your children at home, and NOT on Sunday, then they would sit quietly and the parents were able to worship God undistracted, because the kids were perfect.  It worked for us, our kids were perfect, but our worship was often interupted because some other's kids were noisy, which meant that the parents weren't faithful, which meant that we were better than they, which meant that we were proud, and boasting in our own accomplishments, etc.

I don't know if it was like this for everyone, but I promise that all parents were heavily encouraged to mat-train.

Brent

[Bluejay]

This is a whole new issue that I have not even approached yet.

George, Betty, and Tim Geftakys...Is this how you spell it:

Class Action Lawsuit???

[Arthur]

Ginger Geftakys wrote a little pamplet on Child Training.  Supposed to be real practical.  I still have a copy.   When I read it I was like, huh?  It was all about at what age to put your kid on the matt, what the appropriate duration of matt time was best, how to keep him subdued while on the matt, when the kid could graduate from the matt to taking notes from the lecture, etc.  I was hoping to find something about loving your kids and talking to them about the Lord with some nice children's Bible stories like my mom told me when I little, but I found a bunch of stuff about matts.   I was like man, I want my money back.  But it was only 50 cents, so I figured oh well, maybe I'll take it off my tithe or something, lol.  

Hey, that brings up another memory.  I remember walking thru the acca-mode-ation in Fullerton one day and seeing Ginger giving a little talk on psychology to the teachers at Cornerstone.  She was talking about the levels of thinking -- something about evaluating, modeling, synthesis, decision making, analysis--stuff like that.  Guess she was a genius or something, eh?  LOL  

[Arthur]

Oh hey, I think I found it.

http://www.wccta.net/gallery/fwr/blbehior.htm

Bloom's levels of thinking:

Evaluation - Formulating subjective judgment as the end product resulting in personal values/opinions with no real right or wrong answers
Synthesis - Creatively or divergently applying prior knowledge and skills to produce something new or original
Analysis - Examining specific parts of information to develop divergent conclusions by identifying motives or causes, making inferences, and/or finding evidence to support generalizations
Application - Using previously learned information in a new situation to solve problems that have single or best answers
Comprehension - Understanding the information
Knowledge - Learning the information

I'm telling ya--any noob with a search engine can look like Einstein.  

[Arthur]

Hmm, just read it.  Look at the highest form of thinking:  "Evaluation...no real right or wrong answers."  
Hmm...that could be one way to rationalize ripping off God's people.  

[moonflower]

This is a whole new issue that I have not even approached yet.

George, Betty, and Tim Geftakys...Is this how you spell it:

Class Action Lawsuit???

No, I'm afraid if this Ed Teune doesn't settle down a bit, the parents who actually utilized mat training are the ones who will be investigated and brought into court.
Personally, if my child would fall asleep for a nap in someone else's house on a baby's "sleeping bag", which is what I used,
it was nice. If my active young child(ren) did not sleep, he was given toys, coloring books, mom's lap, and if he had reached his "limit" of being able to be quiet/still, he would get a walk outside with mom. A nice walk.  
However, babies are capable of understanding a lot more than we give them credit for, some more than others.

[moonflower]

An agency follows up on any and all reports it receives from any and all reporters.


March 11 modification: This post and the previous one were in response to someone literally begging for the pamphlet by Ginger Geftakys regarding child training, which they had not seen and wanted posted on this BB, with the intention that it might shed light on the child "abuse" that was allowed to go in the assemblies.
This person also doubted that the government would be interested in perusing a bulletin board to check for possible indications of child abuse.
Those two, or more,  postings have since been removed, and I didn't want my posting to look as if I were suggesting that someone call and report child abuse. I was just trying to get the poster to see how easy it would be to have someone reported to an agency investigating child abuse, and was trying to get them to e-mail in private rather than on the BB, where more than just assembly and ex-assembly folks are reading.

[editor]

Here is my opinion about child abuse in the Assembly:

Children are NOT sytematically abused.  If called upon to testify, I will vehemently assert that we did NOT physically abuse our children by following Assembly protocol.

Mat-training and no-fussing are not the worst things you can do to a child.  If used moderately, they are actually helpful in a certain sense.  Spanking is a biblical method, and the Assembly used books by Christians who had no involvement with the ministry.  I remember when the Fugates taught in Fullerton.  They thought we were a little looney, but they put on a good seminar even so.

I was very zealous with mat-training, etc. but I did not abuse my kids!

What did occur, in my case and in many others, is that all the control and performance based pressure and expectations, resulted in TOTALLY turning the kids off to anything that had to do with God.  I began to notice this tendency in our ten year old, right when we left, and most of the leaders have lost their first-born sons, due to the overemphasis on control.

There is nothing wrong with spanking, or teaching children to be quiet.  The problem comes when we equate these things with "faithfullness," and demand that the children look a certain way to be, "good examples."  This trains into them a very false idea about who God is, and causes them to despise the Lord, or to become proud and arrogant because they are able to perform.

If you look closely, you can readily observe the latter attitude in some of the Assembly kids who post on this website and the Assembly websites.  The arrogance and pride is stunning.

Since leaving, I have learned that Assembly kids are not the only kids who know how to behave.  Also, people who had "terrible two's" found that the kids outgrew this in a couple years, and this occurred without no-fussing.

Child training, according to Betty Geftakys, is detrimental, but it does not constitute physical abuse, at least in my mind.

Brent

[Bearing Long]

Dear Ed,
I know personally of two things you might want to consider:
     1)  Wrong teaching on child training was corrected in our home and gathering over 15 years ago.
     2)   Love learns, forgives, and makes things right and in turn is forgiven:
            You speak of the crippling fear you experienced in the assembly, yet you have no idea the crippling fear
            you instilled in an innocent little one because of a personal encounter with you.
            Have you made it right with that little one?

            It would be good to believe the best about our brethren, hoping they find deliverance from deception, pride, and besetting sins as we have for you.

Sincerely, Bearing Long

[retread]

...
There is nothing wrong with spanking, or teaching children to be quiet.
...
Brent

The question to ask is how severe have these "spankings" been.  Have these "spankings" ever been so bad that parents might not take their kids to the doctor for medical care including potentially serious medical issues because of the fact that the doctor may find bruises on them from overly zealous "spankings"?  Have there been assembly members that have bruised their children?  If you are bruising a child, I think that this would go a way beyond "spanking".  Has this happened in the assembly?  I assume that in most cases, no serious permanent "physical" damage would be done from the spankings, but this could still stop the parents from taking a child to a doctor for some serious medical condition, because the doctor might also see the bruises and report this to the authorities.  In other words these bruises may result in a situation that is very harmful to the child, other than the physical injury of the "spanking" itself.

[moonflower]

Dear Ed,
I know personally of two things you might want to consider:
     1)  Wrong teaching on child training was corrected in our home and gathering over 15 years ago.
     2)   Love learns, forgives, and makes things right and in turn is forgiven:
            You speak of the crippling fear you experienced in the assembly, yet you have no idea the crippling fear
            you instilled in an innocent little one because of a personal encounter with you.
            Have you made it right with that little one?

            It would be good to believe the best about our brethren, hoping they find deliverance from deception, pride, and besetting sins as we have for you.

Sincerely, Bearing Long

B.L.,
Is this a rhetorical question, or does the little one have a name? Ed, at least, gave you his name.
I believe that Ed is expressing his feelings and is unaware of any possible changes that may have taken place in his absence as you are unaware of any changes in his life.
Abuse just trickles on down the hierarchy line, doesn't it?  
Bearing Longer  

[wolverine]

If you look closely, you can readily observe the latter attitude in some of the Assembly kids who post on this website and the Assembly websites.  The arrogance and pride is stunning.

Brent,

You know as well as I do that 99% of my posts are tongue-in-cheek...

Fan

[Luke Robinson]

I read a recent report that one man who is a Christian, says that circumcision is child abuse.  Think about it.  No antisthetic.  No pain killers.  

If you look closely, you can readily observe the latter attitude in some of the Assembly kids who post on this website and the Assembly websites.  The arrogance and pride is stunning.

Brent, I know that I am one of the people you are referring to because you said that to me personally a few times.  

Answer me this, Mr. Tr0ckman.  When do you graduate?  From being the "arrogant assembly brat" to being a good, humble Christian like yourself?  

So ONLY the ASSEMBLY kids are arrogant.  And WHEN do they stop being ASSEMBLY kids?  When you give your permission?  

Please answer at your disposal.  But use logical statements.  No character assassinations or age refferals.  

Let's talk about the issues here.