Tuesday, July 3, 2007

Breaking away, case study from Xenos

Xenos Christian Fellowship is a mega-church in Columbus Ohio which makes heavy use of strong "home churches" to create a large group / small group feel. The church is very well known and influential. Strange Things at Xenos gives one a feel for their outlook and their distinctives. It also, publishes on its website heavily on the issue of church discipline.

There was an extended discussion of Xenos on Byron Harvey's website and the following is
post 14

I was in the college Ministry.

Now, I would not classify Xenos as a cult per se, but in the college group at least, I saw quite a few cultlike elements in the social structure that the church structure fed. Let me take you on a journey. I will probably tip my identity in sharing this, but I am not too concerned with that.

I moved to Columbus Ohio in the fall of 1996. I was lonely, immature, and depressed, although at the time I would not have said it as such. It was not long till an acquaintance of mine told me about this meeting in one of the dorm study rooms where a bunch of Christians were having a discussion group. At first, I was against it, but he enticed me with the prospect of attractive young females. Being a young man of 18, I went of course.

Over the next few weeks, I became a regular attendee, debating points of the Christian faith, and giving the arguments that were presented to me more creedance than they were worth, for at the time I was not trained to spot logical fallacies. To an impressionable mind, they made extraordinary claims, claims of God’s perfect love, perfect justice and whatnot. Growing up in a blue collar catholic family, I ate this stuff up.

Meanwhile, my class attendance started slipping. I had a lot of evening classes, but was encouraged to attend first CT, and then a homechurch, both while skipping out on classes. My grades plummeted.

Now I do realize I had a choice here, I could have stuck to my studies, and surely my life would have been easier for it, but I was confused, empty, a lost soul, and one of the promises Xenos made to me about God is that with the spirit, you are no longer empty.

I accepted Christ on easter of 1997. A week later I was kicked out of school for failing to meet the conditions of my academic probation.

Now, I am grateful for what came next. Xenos took me in, provided a couch to sleep on till I got a job and an apartment, and when my sublet was up, moved me into a ministry house. By this time, I was attending a homechurch, CT, a cell group, along with myriad prayer meetings.

I was on a spiritual high at the time. I was learning all I could about God, about Christianity, and looking back was starting to be groomed for leadership. My house and homechurch leaders started referring to “when I would be a leader”.

Meanwhile, I was still as depressed and as empty as ever. When I talked about this with other xenoids, I was told to keep to the path, God would sort it out.

I also started seeing things that sat very uneasily with me. All other Christian sects were bashed to one form or another, but particularly Catholics, Jehova Witnesses, and to a lesser extant, Mormons. I won’t even go into the venom reserved for non-Christian religions.

I started missing meetings due to work, or just being too depressed to leave the house. One hear or there did not merit comment, but if you missed more than three in a month, leaders started coming to you to voice thier concerns for your spiritual walk.

Finally, a few weeks before Christmas of 1998, things came to a head. I had been neglecting some of my house chores for a few weeks (as had other members of the house, but I was singled out it seems) and was put on probabtion. No missed chores for a month or I was outs. Three days before the month was up, I had been out late with friends seeing a movie, and forgot to do some cleaning. I did it first thing in the morning, but the house leaders decided to make me leave. At first, they wanted me out immediately. I managed to get a whole week out of them.

Needless to say, a week later I was homeless. I was crushed. Everything I had built my adult life around was suddenly gone. I had no friends outside of the church, as outside friends were not forbidden, but they were not encouraged unless they were outreach. My only support network was two hours away, so I went home to my parents.

The next year and a half were hard. I was removed from any support network, and was slowly slipping into darkness. Only a handful of people kept up with me, I would thank them, but all but one have left that group.

I moved back to Columbus in mid 2000, a mental wreck. Like an abused spouse, I went back to the only thing I knew, Xenos. I puttered on for about 7 or 8 months, never regaining the acceptance I had enjoyed previously. I was a fringe member, and outsider. Being on the edge I saw the truly bad aspects of that group. The cliquishness, the social control wielded over members, the selective enforcement of morality and the unhealthy focus on “Sexual Sin”.

My end with the group came with a woman. We started dating, and she was not Christian. I tried to bring her around at first, but she was offended at the groups attitudes towards other religions. We ended up having sex. Knowing I was violating Xonos’ rules, I removed myself from the group. However, that was not enough. Even though I had left of my own accord, they still instituted their church discipline against me, and the few friends I still had in the group were forbidden from speaking to me “For my own good”.

It was the best thing that ever happened to me.

Since then, I broke away from the false promises of my faith, and found my own way. I conquered my depression, have built true, lasting friendships, and have finally gotten my life back on track, all the things Xenos tells you are not possible without God, with the undertone that to be right with God you must be right with Xenos. Looking back, I see the broken people they pulled into their group, and some have gon on to lead rich, fulfilling lives, I can honestly say as of my last check, there were not that many in the college group that were.

I have overcome any resentment I had towards that group, a process that took many years. Through it I have become a better person, and in a way, am glad they treated me the way they did. I would not be the person I am today without Xenos.

I just hope for all those that go to them listening to false promises of fulfillment and meaning in their life, that they find what they are looking for.

I invite any and all comments to this on my own blog at gothic_oreo.livejournal.com. I will make a public post with anonymous comments aloud specifically for that purpous.

What's interesting about the story is that the person has clearly seperated from evangelical Christianity and is quite happy about the effects of the shunning.

If there are any Xenos people out there:

  1. Why discipline on a non member?
  2. Why shunning?
_________

Addendum: There is an interview with the lead pastor for Xenos on discipline at a later post Interview with Xenos on membership and discipline policies

245 comments:

«Oldest   ‹Older   201 – 245 of 245
dardrops said...

@ Night9Hawk:
Dude, when Xenos (or any Bible-believing church) makes the statement that premarital and extramarital sex are a sin, they are merely communicating what God has clearly stated in Scripture. It's not Xenos' opinion.

My point is, Xenos can't control what someone does nor do they try to. They can only state the truth from Scripture, encourage and persuade to repentance, pray for them, etc. They can't follow them around to make sure they aren't sinning, nor would they want to. We trust the Holy Spirit will do the convicting because He's the one who "convicts the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment." Our role is to declare the truth of God, offer help and encouragement and discipline, if it is needed.

"Control" assumes Xenos has the actual power to PREVENT sin, which of course they don't. Even God allows sin because He honors our free will, even when our free will leads us to damage ourselves.

However, the Holy Spirit does tell us that if someone continues in this type of sin without repentance, they need to leave and go do it somewhere else. Unless, of course, they are involved in something illegal like sexual or physical abuse, murder, etc. Then the police DO control them...by throwing them in jail.

For example, I may ask someone to leave my home if they are doing something wrong. That doesn't mean I'm controlling them. They can continue doing it all they want, just not in my home.

You can't "hold anyone to a standard" literally. What are you going to do? Follow them around everywhere? Install spyware on their computer? Put a tracking device on them? Give them 39 lashes? What?

Again, we declare God's truth, offer help and encouragement if they want help and there is repentance. If no repentance, they must leave. That's not control.

Icy Mt. said...

And that, dar, is why Xenos is not a cult. There are plenty of organizations out there that do control their members. What am I going to do? Take all their money. Follow them everywhere? They live in my walled compound and can't leave. Install spyware on their computer? They don't have access to telephone, let alone a computer or bandwidth. Put a tracking device on them? Why, that's a great idea! Give them 39 lashes? So you've been here on Saturdays.

That's a cult folks. Not Xenos.

Icy Mt. said...

Crickets...nothing but crickets.

Anonymous said...

Several years ago I was attending the Xenos Church in Cincinnati. I have looked over the posting on this site and can not tell who belongs to what particular Xenos locale. All I can (and wish) to do is tell of my account at that church.

I was raised in a Catholic family, was a server and in the boy's choir, went to Catholic schools. Of course, as a lot of us did, I left the Roman Catholic faith and was wandering aimlessly in regards to my 'spirituality'. It was during my post collegiate years when a friend of mine invited me to a 'party' being held on their church grounds. Having nothing better to do that evening, I took him up on the invitation and the rest is history.

Back then the church was rather small. It had I would say around 40 active adults in their congregation. Looking back, I would describe this gathering as sort of a recruiting campaign. Heck, who can turn down a church that parties and drinks beer! I was invited to attend their Sunday Central Teaching.

Back then, before they all pitched in from out of their pockets to build a 1/2 million dollar 'church', they held their CT's either in some other church building that so happened to encroach on their property line OR in the basement of one of the Elder's home. I can not really complain of the core message to the teaching but man was I approached endlessly by a lot of the members of the church sorta enquiring and digging into my life and who I am.

Well, I probably at first was a sporatic attendee but soon seemed to be a 'regular'. I even got involved in a home church. But wherever I went with this church I still had fundamental differences in beliefs of several 'christian' aspects. So, I was unable in my own mind to declare myself a member of their church. I was surely glad to be just involved in practicing my faith the best I could at that time in my life.

Well as this story progresses I got more involved in the church by enrolling in a class and helping out with major part of their ministy. On particular Sunday, the friend who invited me to attend the church, confided in my by telling me his 'dirty laundry'. Here I am watching the Bengals game, drinking a beer, enjoying myself, and all the sudden I am bombarded to listen about how my friend has some serious moral issues that he is trying to deal with.

Well ok, I told him. Don't we all. I understand what you are saying and as a matter of fact I am no angel either. Here are some of my weaknesses. You would think such a conversation would be private. I didn't rush off and call up all our mutual friends and tell what a bad boy so-and-so is. But my friend had a lunch with his 'spiritual advisor' who so happens to be one of the elders and so he says accidently told him about our conversation.

One evening, as I was heading to perform a friday night church duty I was part of, my cell phone rang. It was my friend and he was asking me to come speak with him and the elder about my 'transgressions'. Like what the heck! I showed up at their house and it was like some sort of intervention. They said I was no longer allowed to be part of the 'ministry service' I was involved with (which suited me fine) and I told them I never asked to be part of it in the first place. If they did their supposive background check and prequalification then they would realize I was too 'tainted' by their standards to be that involved.

The class I got involved in was one of their core classes which was 16 weeks long, one night a week. There was studying and hw assignments and tests. The class was cool and had good teaching but I personnally didnt have the commitment to memorize all these biblical quotes. When the final came I told them I would not be taking it. HOW SCANDALOUS! Who is this sinner who is so heavily entrenched in our church?

Anonymous said...

There were several other encounters along the way that deteriated my relationship with the people of this church. I never felt true acceptance and friendship with most all the members of the church. Yea they seem to be like 'holy rollers' but not on the ground.

Needless to say I have left that church. I do not wish to disparage them for I believe they think they are acting accordingly. I have heard them denounce any other faith that doesn't partice to their beliefs and I have heard them 'ridicule' individuals who have 'turned their backs on their church'. Its all good. I hope the best for them. One thing is for sure, they still seem to have a very small gathering.

Well I must move on to other things. Thats my story in a nutshell. I think they do practice some 'inappropriate' meathods. I will be back later to narrow in on specific. For now I just wish to paint a broad picture of what I experienced while involved with Xenos Cinti

CD-Host said...

Hi Anon and welcome to the blog. Would you be willing if you are going to keep posting anonymous to just sign with a handle at the bottom. It is not unlikely you will start getting anonymous responses or other anonymous people and it can get confusing.

Thank you for sharing your story. If you don't mind me asking two questions:

1) Did they ask you to confirm your transgressions before expelling you from the ministry activities or were you simply expelled?

2) Did you have any other sort of social sanction (i.e. people withdrawing their friendship)?

3) Where there threats of further action and did you leave the church completely after that on your own?

Smooth Jazz said...

Hey Anon (hi CD, long-time-no-see), I haven't seen any Cinci people on this thread. I'm from up here in the Democrat part of the state.

I know some of those leaders from Cinci, and I know they're reasonable people, albeit a little inexperienced. They've told me about mistakes they've made, so they aren't hard-asses, as far as I can tell.

But just from what you've said here, it's unclear how they wronged you. For example:

* Every organization on the planet might "oust" you from a position of responsible service in that organization if they think you're not on the same page. This isn't a Xenos thing.

* In fact, the Catholics are getting sued because they *wouldn't* "oust" priests & others whom they knew were engaged in morally-reprehensible activities.

* Since it wasn't an issue of excommunication, but rather ministry involvement (I presume it's your ministry position in their High School, Jr. High, or other special-ministry groups), we wouldn't expect it to fall under the guidelines for excommunication, but rather standards for ministry qualifications.

* I don't understand why you grew more involved in a ministry which you disagreed with from the outset. Isn't a clash inevitable, sooner or later?

I'm just saying the information you provided only says the leaders "discovered something" that alarmed them enough to step you out of a particular ministry position. That's really not too helpful, because maybe they should've stepped you out? I don't know, can't tell...

OSU Pre-Med said...

I read through quite a few of the comments on this post, but unfortunately not all, I just wanted to add my experience with Xenos to the comments.

I grew up very involved in a Lutheran church in Columbus. When I was a sophomore in high school my parents moved outside of Columbus, and I got out of touch with many of my friends. I attended many churches over a few year period in Columbus, from the Vineyard to a Southern Baptist Church, I was very open to hearing what different groups had to say, and was always welcomed warmly with open arms.

When I finally came back to attend Ohio State, I contacted a few of my good friends from HS, to find them involved in Xenos as OSU or CSCC students. I was really excited that some of these people had become Christians! I readily accepted their offer to come to group, and was in for a surprise. The first time I came to one of the ministry houses it was for a friday night party, and never talked about Christ at all. There was lots of beer and food and smoking and I was genuinely surprised that Christians would live like that. It was fun, and everyone was super nice, but it was unexpected.

However, I came back time and time again for about 2-3 years, attending both CT and homechurch on and off, sometimes regularly, sometimes weeks or months apart. It was really a fun time, long summer nights just sitting around, going out, having fun--I felt like I was a part of something big and wonderful. As time went on, I did indeed talk about my views on religion and Christ with members, sometimes debating, sometimes agreeing, never with anyone getting upset, but always with me feeling I was entitled to my own beliefs as a Christian (agree to disagree?) After all, I still attended other church services outside of Xenos.

As my friends got more involved in Xenos though, eventually moving into the ministry houses, I grew further and further apart from them, and then slowly became more and more of an outsider because they expected me to make a commitment to Xenos and Xenos only-to stop attending all other services, to come to ALL the meetings, to move into a ministry house like they had done. I started attending less and less, there was an awkwardness and some passive aggressive comments that just made me feel uncomfortable hanging around those (who had become my good friends!) who looked at me as though I was an outsider. It was at that point that I realized it was my "Sh*t or get off the pot" moment. I was not one of them, it was clear to both myself and them.

Over the next month or two I was very busy with school, work, and research. I finally did make it back to homechurch, and afterwards I was almost interrogated about where I had been for that period of time. It was around this time also that I decided to move in with my fiance. They told me that it was biblicaly wrong, and not to do it, and slowly my invitations to events trickled down to none. At that point I just gave up on hanging out with them anymore. And it sucked, and I'm still bummed about it, because I feel like most of my friends from the group were genuinely wonderful, very nice people. They really cared about me and each other, and never judged me about the past. However, as soon as I made it clear that I couldn't commit to the group as they had, I was out. It was like day and night--as if I had said I didn't want to be part of their family anymore so they immediately dropped our friendship. That was about 9 months ago. I have talked to a few of them on and off since, but haven't hung out--it's just too painfully obvious that they think I'm "beyond hope." The last party I went to I ended up sitting in a group of people with no one really talking to me. Very clique-ish.

OSU Pre-Med said...

Anyways, apart from the story, and somewhat as part of the aftermath, my problems with Xenos are the following:

-The drinking, smoking, and partying. I don't think this is the way to lead by example. It may draw an alternative crowd who might not otherwise give church a chance to the group, but I think it somewhat tarnishes what they are trying to do...like I said, not exactly leading by example.

-The clique-like feeling to the group. I witnessed this firsthand, and I've spoken with a lot of people who are turned off by it when they attended Xenos as well. I have never attended any other church where I was not immediately made welcome and taken into the group and introduced (yup that's right, no one ever made an effort to introduce me to people at Xenos), and really felt part of the group. I'm not a shy person, but it was hard to get to know people.

-The pressure to commit more time to Xenos, move in, join, whatever--I think if I had not been pressured to "take it to the next level" I would still be hanging out with this group, learning about Christ, slowly getting more involved. Isn't teaching the word to non-Christians part of the goal? Nothing is more off-putting to someone who doesn't believe to be forced into something they aren't ready for, or for someone who DOES believe to be told that their old beliefs are wrong and they need to join "X group"

-Lastly, being "dumped." Yup, it felt like my Xenos friends were breaking up with me once they found out I wasn't ready to commit. Seriously. They don't call, its awkward when I see them, maybe they avoid me in public. Haha, okay, maybe not the last one, but I think honey is sweeter than vinegar. I miss(ed) them, I lik(ed) them, they are not teaching me a lesson, they are making me resentful and angry about what they and their group did to me. I want my old friends back, I am just going on now and telling people bad things about their church, that's not a way to get new members, that's a way to frighten people off from ever coming and hearing the word.

Anyways, just a small rant, maybe a little jumbled, but I went with writing what I was feeling, this is not a lab report analyzing the situation, just saying what's on my mind.

Anonymous said...

Just a quick observation, I used to attend Xenos but left because I found the leadership (especially Dennis) to be extremely critical of other churches and pastors and prone to personally attacking other churches who didn't do church the way they did (as if Xenos never experienced any problems). I find Dennis's thin skin about being attacked rather hypocritical, as he is very quick to attack others.

Smooth Jazz said...

Although I'm not involved in Xenos, Columbus, I would like to say that I agree and also disagree on your personal attack of that church and Dennis McCallum.

On the one hand, "extremely critical of other churches and pastors and prone to personally attacking other churches" obviously is not inherently wrong if "attacking" means "disagreement" or simply "criticism", as per your own post. It also probably isn't wrong if "attacking" is aimed at truly reprehensible, immoral, censurable behavior.

I shared with CD-Host last year, the "Family of Brothers and Sisters" we call "The Body of Christ" (universal) truly reflects a "family" in all its inglorious glory. Mutual admiration, support and respect is mixed with criticism, "judicious critiques", resentment and even hatred.

The extremes are disgraceful behavior. Uncritical devotion is just as dysfunctional as the resentment/hatred extreme. "Uncritical devotion" is the "enabling" dysfunction, and the "resentment/hatred" dysfunction is destructively divisive, and there's been far too much of both extremes in Church History.

What is very cool about the Body of Christ (universal) is our ability to still embrace each other as Christian brothers and sisters, despite our long history of disputes, some petty and others quite bloody.

So I would disagree that criticism is inherently wrong, but agree that extreme devotion or resentment is truly rotten eggs.

And I would very much agree that "I find Dennis's thin skin about being attacked rather hypocritical," if it were true. And perhaps it is true, but I'm not involved enough to say.

What I do know, however, is that I have published some critiques of Xenos and specific teachings from there, including Dennis', over 2 years ago at our eZine (see "Driscoll vs. the WeeWars at http://neozine.org/inside/160), and yet Xenos is still a friend and ally, even if they disagree with the critiques. I doubt they consider the criticisms malicious, so it isn't a problem, even though people at Xenos subscribe to the NeoZine and read it.

If I wrote another critique, I would imagine their willingness to receive it would be the same. Certainly we at NeoXenos (Northeast Ohio) are not above criticism, and we get it at our NeoZine. (See the negative feedback in "A Declaration of Freedom" -- http://neozine.org/inside/3944 -- which also demonstrates my conviction that Christian History is not above reproach or critique.)

I do appreciate your consideration of this humble opinion, which is certainly not meant to contradict yours, but to offer some balancing points.

Smooth Jazz said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Thomas said...

christian obscessive compulsive disorder. disorder of all kinds.That is what you find at Xenos.I was there before it was even called Xenos. Anyone can easily dismiss what i have to say because i ended up on crack.So don't listen to me go their for yourself and hear and see. I was blessed and ruined at the same time. If you want to be normal don't go there. Gross immorality from elder and leaders at Xenos, Hardly Christian character.

CD-Host said...

Hi Tom. Welcome to the blog. Can you be a bit more specific? You are throwing around a lot of charges without any clear specifics?

What does "Christian obsessive compulsive disorder" mean to you? What sorts of immorality did you see and from whom?

sketchesbyjulie said...

All I know is My daughter is lost in Xenos, people in our family are ill and at the end of there lives and there is no contact, if I were to be angry about her not coming for xmas to see her grandparents I will be verbally attacked by her husband, who incidently attacked my son in my house because my son and daughter were insulting one another and the husband was furious because my son was arguing with her. I have completely lost my relationship with her, she seems to always be sick, angry very opinionated and some how extremely poor. She allows her husband to say and do nasty things to us. I just dont know what to do but if your a parent you know that this hurts on a whole different level, it is a smack in the face of the people that have sacriced for her, who have loved her, who took care of her...

sketchesbyjulie said...

is it christian to hurt your family or to ignore your family? I will never get past this, she is my daughter and I miss her and can't understand what is going on for her to ignore us or allow us to be hurt and can she believe she is on the right path? What happens if her child does this to her, will she think her child is godly, is kind?

CD-Host said...

Hello hurt mother, welcome to the blog. I'm sorry about your family distress. In trying to tie this to Xenos, I get that you are estranged from your daughter. Do you believe Xenos is responsible for this estrangement, encouraged this estrangement, isn't encouraging it but is obligated to intervene and isn't. Have you asked Xenos for assistance in this matter?

In other words, forgetting the details of the estrangement, what has been your involvement with Xenos and what do you believe they are failing to do?

Anonymous said...

I go to Xenos now. I too also left the church because of work. But I came back because I miss the teachings and my friends. I also lived in the houses as well. I'm sorry that they ask you to leave the house and what not, i have never had to get kick out because of not doing chores, i miss my chore days a lot actually. Xenos is where I accepted Christ.

They don't ban you from seeing non christian people they just want to make sure that you are safe.

Also with the sexual sin part God wants us to wait to have sex. Read 1 Tessalonians chapter 3 to 4 and see what I mean. Yes it wrong and we should wait.

For also for you CD-Host it's okay to have a dating relationship outside of being a Christian. But you will always have issues when it comes down to religion and always going through arguments. I should know I been through it and now I date a great christian person.

If you miss meetings that is okay. Simply just explained your issues. They are just sad and they miss you. They are a great group of friends and caring. They try to help you as much as possible.

God doesn't give you something if you can't handle it. Its good to have friends help you with burdens and not keeping it to yourselves.

You have a voice use it. Use your words let them know how you feel when those things were happened. Keeping it inside you will make everything so little get to you.

Thanks for reading

CD-Host said...

Hi Fairy Dust welcome to the blog! Glad you showed up, hope you subscribed. The Xenos threads get off and on activity. I don't know whether you got a response regarding your positive experience at a house but next time someone shows up with a negative experience it would good for you all to dialogue.

And I agree with you that Xenos seems like a terrific church. I've subjected them to a lot of scrutiny I've heard stories both here and by email of the issues and it is hard to see any misconduct on the part of the church.

Xenos has young people in positions of responsibility. Young people in these authority positions make mistakes that older people wouldn't. Xenos institutionally has checks and balances to provide corrective mechanisms. The people who are complaining didn't follow through on the process enough for those checks and balances to kick in.

I'm not sure what they can do about that.

Thomas said...

Lets all get hopped up on some XENOS

Chelsea N Moore said...

Xenos people are crazy. Seriously. None of them are better people than me...all of them are fake and on a power trip. I know many of them...and I have never seen a less genuine group of people. The end. And they can contact me and try and argue about it.

CD-Host said...

Chelsea --

1) How old are you? (I just want to make sure you aren't a minor)

2) What specifically happened?

Unknown said...

"Shunning and excommunication are forms of manipulation. Cults use manipulation. Therefore, Xenos is a cult."
Well cars are in a garage, so standing in one makes me a car!

UberGenius said...

I started attending Xenos back when it was known as Fishhouse. I was there for 7 years and the doctrine was thoroughly orthodox. There was a great sense of community and a sincere desire to love God in both intellectual and practical ways. However the immaturity of the Senior Pastor produced a very cult-like style.

Typical leadership behaviors passed down from the Senior Pastor to local homechurch leaders seen at Xenos between 1980-1987:

Manipulative

They never recognized the rights of others and see their self-serving behaviors as permissible. They appear to be charming, yet are covertly hostile and domineering, seeing members as merely an instrument to be used. They dominate and humiliate their members.

Lack of Remorse, Shame or Guilt

Often when manipulation or humiliation didn't work the leaders would expose a deep-seated rage. They didn't appear to see others around them as people, but only as targets and opportunities. Instead of friends, they have victims and accomplices who end up as victims. The end always justifies the means and they let nothing stand in their way.

Poor Behavioral Controls/Impulsive Nature

Rage and abuse, alternating with small expressions of love and approval produce an addictive cycle for leader and member. Many of the leaders believe they were entitled to every wish, no sense of personal boundaries, no concern for their impact on others. The followers see them as near perfect.

Leadership meetings would involve being cussed out and humiliated by the head Pastor for "not hitting your !@#$ing growth numbers." Much time was devoted to gossip about members of the home groups under the guise of "planning their spiritual development".

In short, they exhibited many of the qualities of antisocial personality disorder (Sociopathy) stemming again from the one central extremely influential leader.

I left knowing much more about scripture, evangelism, discipleship and community (all orthodox)than when I joined. These things I learned were also, to be fare, probably a result of this same Senior Pastor (and for that I am grateful). I also left with a notebook labeled "Abusive Leadership" filled with hundreds of things that I swore I would never do as a leader of a local church.

Unfortunately these practices are still continuing today as I have had two friends ,one who lived with me at a ministry house in the 1980s, and another college student leave Xenos in the last 3 months due to manipulation.



UberGenius said...

Method of manipulation didn't become apparent to me until I became a home group leader. At my first Leander's meeting we questioned in detail about lives of newcomers by Dennis and sphere leader. Non-Christians were to have multiple people "reach out" to the, and invite the, to group activities. We would review the decision continuum ( a document that describes an individuals's path from non-believer to believer and coordinated events and discussions to get them to believe).. I didn't have a problem with the continuum per se but if someone spent too much time and was determine by Dennis, sphere leaders or others to be stuck, we were encouraged to move on. All of a sudden ten people were no longer calling to get together with you. The same thing would happen if someone did accept salvation. They were then expected to be on a ministry continuum. Questions like attendance at CT (central teaching)' workers meetings, cell group meetings, who was discipling them, who were they discipling, what classes were they taking at Xenos, who were they reaching out to evangelistically, who were they dating, what were their suspected sin problems, were asked. The was a dossier approach filled with gossip. I felt like I was in the KGB or the mob at these meetings. These took place on the Weber bldg in the second floor conference room monthly.

Larger monthly leaders meetings run by Martha, Dennis, Gary, or Keith or occasionally other elders, would drill down into method. I think any evangelical church would have found these meetings helpful especially one whose lay leadership was growing so quickly!

The reason people felt love-bombed over the decades is because they were. When you have numerous people coordinating invites made to look like natural relationships it is rightly labeled cultish behavior!

I quickly lost my taste for gossip that occurred at Weber rd Bldg and permeated every aspect of leadership. Dennis seemed to know about everything that was going on in my personal life within weeks of me discussing it with so-called friends. These were things like new job or where I was living or dating(not sleeping with so no sin and no appearance here of so no reason he should know). When I missed a large(250 person leaders) meeting other leaders, elders sphere group leaders and even Dennis would ask what I had been doing that was more important than Leaders meeting?

Yep, you guessed it, at every level there was a plan for you life and puppet-masters gently, covertly manipulating your actions. Nothing is as it appears here and you don't get the full experience until you become a leader.

If you have 16+ hrs a week to spend on church and have a people-pleasing nature, and have are insecure, you just need to follow the Xenos way and strap on your What Would Dennis Do bracelet and you too can be a leader in 12-18 months whether you have leadership ability or a heart for the lost or not. I left after 7 years with some life-long friendships. The majority of people were great people but homegroup leadership and above were largely hirelings. Their willful manipulation of those under their care made them so!

John 10:12 says:
12 The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it.

What the Pastors and Elders at Xenos don't realize is that people can sense this manipulation and it comes across as disingenuineness. Like talking to a politician or used-car salesman. They leave and most can't quite put their fingers on why. My contention is it is not flesh and blood that reveals it to them but the Holy Spirit saying "you are being led by hirelings"!

Haven't had that feeling in a church since leaving Xenos in 1987, thank God.


CD-Host said...

Hi mandy Hi Uber.

Sorry for the delayed response. Dennis and Keith have been pretty clear there were abuses in the 1980s. I'm not sure if they will agree with all your details but they aren't trying to defend Xenos' practices then.

I'm curious about your comment about leaders being cussed at and gossip gathering and your claim that is still going on. I just want to clarify here. Are you actually saying that Dennis is still maintaining a gossip dossier on regular attendees like what was happening in the 1980s or that leaders are being interrogated that harshly?

UberGenius said...

Also the first time I ever heard the how to address the cult accusation was at a larger leaders meeting taking place at bldg4 in a warehouse off of Sinclair rd in the early 1980s. Martha Mccallum was leading the meeting and she encouraged us to:

1. ask for the details of who was being manipulated and how (they won't know the details unless they attended the home group leaders meeting which were always held behind closed doors)

2. Claim that you were unaware of any such behavior (this was known by a few of us as the Big Lie because these claims were common and 6-8 per year per home group or 250-400 complaints per year across Xenos)
12 The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it.

3. On the rare occasion someone knows the details and knows you were aware of the behavior suggest that you need to be involved due to sin in people's lives. (This was a red herring due to the fact that sin problems could have been handled by home group leaders without involving sphere leaders let alone sr pastors and more importantly most of the claims were of ungodly manipulation and gossip by leaders SINNING against members)

4. When 1-3 fail, (lead people away from actual cause ...sr leadership) claim that the problem comes from young leaders in college ministry houses due to rapid growth. And repeat steps 1-3.

I remember one elder who claimed to have been gossiped about by Martha. When he confronted her she lashed out with all sorts of false accusations. I was stunned by the exchange. Moments later while I was talking to this elder and trying to calm him down. Dennis came up got in his face and threatened his life if he ever talked to his mother(Martha) again. Dennis was in his 30s at the time and had been leading Christian Ministry for over 12 yrs by then. These sorts of temper tantrums were common place back then and demonstrated the hireling aspect of spiritual leadership that remains at Xenos.

In the 1980s the leaders were held in high-regard by those who didnt know them and low-regard by those who knew them well and had matured in Christ outside of Fishhouse (Xenos). Having just read Thomas A. Kempis' Imataion of Christ in 1980 I found that the leaders had few of the virtues ascribed by the author and most of the vices. And to bring this feedback up one-on-one was to be met with extreme derision "You are legalistic" was the common reply. Not recognizing the difference between salvation and sanctification. Sanctification was about attendance in meeting and growth of homegroup numbers at Xenos. I was openly mocked by Dennis for stating that I wanted to work my unwholesome speech and coarse jesting in Ephesians 4:29, 5:4! When I turned off a soft core porn movie that had been playing at a Xenos recruting party for non-believers an elder threatened me if I didn't turn it back on immediately. When I refused he took a swing at me and we had to be pulled apart. To be fare to him he had had 6 beers by then and was a mean drunk, so it wasn't surprising to me that he attacked me.

There are hundreds of such stories like these. I have moved on and helped plant two churches. I have led several home groups at other churches, led teen ministries, college apologetics groups and outreach to international students. Much of my discipleship, evangelism, and apologetics capability were a direct result of Xenos and Dennis! None of my leadership, or sanctification came from Xenos. Xenos served as a bad example in both cases.

UberGenius said...

CD-host thanks for your reply. Have enjoyed your moderation here and elsewhere.

I'm not saying anything specifically about what goes on behind closed doors since 1980s (see method 1 above).

Surprised to here Dennis ever claim that he was root of abuses. Always heard him use methods 1-4 above.

My claim is that 2 people close to me have recently left due to manipulation. Further that the cause is most likely the culture of promoting hirelings that is he same culture that I experienced. In other places I have said that Xenos is:

A great place to learn scripture, apologetics, evangelism, and discipleship

Takes Christian Ministry seriously as scripture demands

Thoroughly orthodox in theology

On the forefront of engaging postmodern culture (and I have attended Summer Institute 5 times in the last decade).

Has a great intellect in Dennis ( I own several of his books and still use A faith that makes sense in evangelism, also Death of truth and Walking in Victory)

But I continue to find Martha's 4-step methodology online from Xenos leader (not members) and coming to me through friends who have left injured who feel they were manipulated.

Also in the 1980s Dennis and Gary were very clear that there had been abuses in the Fishhouse days. But their point was they knew how they had arisen and hadmfixedmthe problem. The fact that they have now come back and openly admitted to abuses in the 1980s seems like more of a methodology.

Step 5 - admit to abuses in the past but suggest an analogy ... as Christians mature in Christ so too can Christian ministries mature in Christ and abuses occurred when we were immature ( albeit 10-20 years old in Christ)

A. My friends could be outliers ( where abuse has no correlation to past systemic manipulation instant intend by founders and propagated by elders, sphere, home group leaders in 1970s and 1980s and some say 1990s)

B. Xenos leaders could have done a poor job iof assessing the cause of the manipulation when performing their gap analysis and thereby applied the wrong intervention to resolving the problem.

If A above then claims of abuse will reduce over time. Else B they will remain constantly high compared to similar large 5000 member non-denominational churches in the US.

I am not claiming that B is easy to spot if you are in Xenos leadership. Corporate culture is as invisible to most as social culture. We don't realize that we have glasses strapped to our head. Clearly the ends of discipleship are worth the means of manipulation in the glasses of Xenos leadership of the 70s and 80s. Why presume they have been able to take those glasses off?

My interest is in full and fair disclosure:

If you join a home group you will be asked to participate in 14-16 hrs of meetings per week.

If you don't attend a couple of these meetings 3+ people will ask you why you don't take your walk seriously.

If you don't aspire to some level of leadership you will be asked why you don't take your walk seriously.

If your friends don't become interested in Xenos you will be asked why you aren't investing your time more productively by spending time with other prospects.

Strong-willed Iconoclastic individuals that are well-trained in theology and practical Christian maturity will thrive at Xenos as I did. But people-pleaders without a background of thinking for themselves are in danger of joining the historic ranks of the abused.


UberGenius said...

Correction ( out damn iPad) in A. above parenthetical statement should read " instantiated by founders" iPad spell checker changed it to " instant intend by founders" which clearly makes no sense.

UberGenius said...

Oh BTW have friends that were in leadership from mid-80s until 2005 consistently complained about the same things I have. So maybe Xenos has changed in the last 9 years.

UberGenius said...

Can't seem to get off of this site. The real grind I have with Xenos is that people can develop a great knowledge of doctrinal truth at Xenos. But when someone is led to Christ and then discipled the individual leading them becomes their spiritual parent. When this parent-figure then manipulates and abuses them many seem to transfer this view directly to their view of God.

I attended a church where over 1000 people migrated from Xenos. And time after time in the mid-1990s I would pray for people who would share that they imagined God as an abusive bully. Although none of these individuals would represent him that way on a basic doctrine test. The impact of the spiritual parenting by an abusive spiritual parent had a lasting impact on their view of who God was, much the same way a abusive father impacts a child's view of God.

I don't think there was intent by the leaders at Xenos to destroy these people's view of God. I don't think they realize the how deeply the image of God is rooted in our early spiritually formative experiences.

These images however have a more powerful impact on our emotions and behaviors than our doctrinal knowledge about God. And I spent the better part of the 1990s cleaning up the mess of immature abusive leaders at Xenos. And once again have been pulled back into that task in the last 5 months.

Anonymous said...

It's been interesting reading all the comments.

I'm on my way out from Xenos. I've been involved for 5 or 6 years. I've always struggled with being as consistent with attending meetings as what was expected of me, but now that I am a new parent, in just seems too overwhelming and exhausting to attend multiple things a week (and trying to keep up with my other friendships, family commitments, my business, be a good spouse & parent etc.)

After my attendance has dropped, I was confronted by the leadership team of my homechurch. The meeting basically was like a "move along" type of meeting - either fully commit, or find somewhere else.

It really sucks. I love the people I've met at Xenos. I've grown a lot, learned a lot, loved a lot. I wish it wasn't such an "all or nothing" attitude, where someone who is trying their best and feels like they're drowning is guilt-tripped out because they don't have the capacity to be as involved as the leadership would like. I just really can't do it.

I don't know where to find a new church home where I can have the open, honest, loving and meaningful relationships I found at Xenos. And I'm heartbroken about the inevitable drifting away of my Xenos friendships.

Unknown said...
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Unknown said...
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CD-Host said...

Hi Chrissy --

I'm sorry you pulled your question, it was a good one. I'll respect your privacy so I won't answer it but if you come back and later do want an answer I'd be happy to.

anonymous said...

I had an awful experience encountering these people. I went to high school with a girl who became swooned by them. She eventually moved into one of their ministry houses and started their ways. She still is with them and I am so glad I no longer speak to her or have any type of connection to the rest of them. They are crazy people who think they know the lord when they have no idea. They are brain washed and told everything they do must be in favor of god and for the greater good. They knock on other faiths mainly catholics and think they are better than them. It's truly disgusting and I wouldn't wish anyone to get involved with them. Their mega-church says it all as these people are really messed up and have no idea what they are doing. Home churches are very cult like and how the whole thing is set up is freaky. I would never try to get in touch with these folks. They're nuts!

doalright said...

Oh man oh man wake up folks it's a cult plain and simple. You're never alone (a.k.a. don't have a chance to be with your own thoughts), they suck up all your time and all your friends become Xenos people. Tadaa - you're trapped! It's a well oiled machine. At coffee shops near OSU campus you'll routinely see pairs of 20-somethings, same gender, sitting opposite from each other each with an open bible. They're always talking about some type of strain occurring between their romantic relationship and their commitment to home church (jee... ever wonder why EVERYONE has the same exact relationship problem?). In the 90's I got suckered into a "party" which turned out to be a bible study. Bait and switch much? Also, I was once suddenly in the company of a whole lot of cute girls. What a stud! Except, next thing I knew we were on long car rides in the middle of nowhere, when these definitely-not-sleeping-with-me femms go into an over the top testimonial session. "Whoah ladies I'm Jewish! My mom would be feklempt!" A cult is a cult. Very nice, very talented, and unfortunately, very naive people get sucked into them. BTW, the girl who was attempting to get me into the cult has long since left and whattaya think she has to say about it? CULT. She was also massively weird about sex for a while (she's happily married now which is great). Hey, at least this place won't have you drinking poison Kool-aid or lighting yourself on fire. You could do worse? Pro-tip: want PROOOOOF of god? Ask 'em about the dead sea scrolls. *facepalm*

doalright said...

Also, to dispel any notion that the 80's was some anomalous bad entire-decade for Xenos: my experiences were from the late 90s to early 2000s. Also, these guys infiltrated my public high-school using teachers as recruiters. Yeah, straight up: teachers bringing students to meetings. An obvious violation of church/state separation but everything was so 'cool' nobody realized what was really happening. Xenos a cult? Ya think!?

CD-Host said...

@doalright

A good deal of what you are describing is pretty standard for churches. You sound secular and seem to not like high commit religious activities. What you are describing, would be equally true of orthodox jews (especially hasidic), since you mentioned you were Jewish and the hassles and isolation involved in their practices. For a cult you need practices that go well beyond high commitment. For example lots of emotional abuse to undermine confidence, contradictory messages to undermine confidence...

But you certainly are making the point that Xenos membership can be and is for many the center of their social life.

Chip said...

Having trouble posting. This is a test

Chip said...

Thanks for the discussion and for the many thoughtful comments (I especially thought most of what E had to say was spot on). I'd add a few comments of my own if I thought they'd matter at all (see Dennis' earlier comments regarding "butt-kissing").

I thought I might turn this in a more positive direction: I'm wondering if folks might chime with recommendations of Columbus churches with robust body life in which they've had particularly good experiences.

follower of christ said...

The time to expose the Heresy of this Church is at hand.

Those of you afflicted by the church of Xenos. We need your help to expose their false doctrine. If you are brave enough to share your testimony with us. We might be able to save others from falling pray to this evil church who seeks to corrupt our youth with their skewed view of the bible.

Standing face to face with these false teachers, Jesus Christ the Son of God, called them "hypocrites", "blind guides, " "blind, " "whited sepulchres, " "serpents, " and "ye generation of vipers" (Matt. 23:23-34)

Should we not do the same?
contact us at xenos.revealed@gmail.com for further information

Romans 16:17-18

I appeal to you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught; avoid them. For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naive.

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