UCCtruths

Without any fuel left in his conspiracy engine, Associate Missouri Mid-South Associate Conference Minister John Dorhauer has decided, again, to turn his dishonesty on this humble web site. From his latest post on Talk2Action.org:

Often, when I talk about the former, I refer to conspiratorial tactics. And when I do, I am asked why I don't allude to conspiracies when churches vote to leave their own denomination to join us.

Though I find the question disingenuous (because those who ask it know the answer, and use the question as a clever tool to delude others who are less informed about the internal dynamics involved in these matters), I will respond to it here.

On the www.ucctruths.org (a name which, like the Institute on Religion and Democracy, suggests something to the uninformed other than what it actually is) website, the question is posed in this way:

When the Cathedral of Hope in Dallas decided to leave their denomination (the Metropolitan Community Churches) for the UCC, did we consider that a conspiracy?

To answer as directly as possible: no. `We' (those of us in the United Church of Christ who write and talk about conspiracy tactics leveled against our churches to remove them from the denomination) do not consider that a conspiracy.

Dorhauer's attention to detail seems only to be matched by his attention span and apparent inability to read more than one sentence at a time. For starters, this web site is UCCtruths.COM, not .ORG. Since Dorhauer doesn't give his readers the benefit of actually seeing what was posted on this site with a link, here is the whole paragraph of what was posted:

When the Cathedral of Hope in Dallas decided to leave their denomination (the Metropolitan Community Churches) for the UCC, did we consider that a conspiracy? Some peripheral facts might lead you to think as much - after all, they began conversation with the UCC at least 18 months before joining, they were headed by a UCC minister and they were embroiled in their own internal, divisive politics. In the end, we respect Cathedral of Hope's decision because we respect a local church's ability to discern for itself what is best for it's members. It wasn't a conspiracy. Whether we like it or not, our polity gives local churches this freedom to make these decisions.

When you actually read the whole post, you get an entirely different picture than the conspiracy Dorhauer cooks up in his post. Plainly speaking, John Dorhauer dishonestly represented what was directly stated on this web site - which is why he doesn't provide a link to this web site. It's also why I suspect Dorhauer doesn't give his readers the benefit of any tangible proof of a church stealing conspiracy - he either doesn't have any proof or he's afraid that if his readers actually saw the evidence, they wouldn't believe him either.

All of this nonsense from a guy whose salary is paid for by your OCWM dollars.

Here's the link to the details of how this site unraveled John Dorhauer's conspiracy theory.