Shadows of WCG Next Generation posted the preliminary results of a poll. AFAIK, the poll is still open for voting, though. While I don’t endorse everything on the site, “J” has, at least IMO, bent over backwards to give credit where credit is due and vice-versa.
The poll really is disturbing because it points to something I’ve come to realize over time: Most do not trust either “side” (as though there are only two) in the UCG struggle. The finding that “The majority believe both parties, the GCE and the COE are incorrect” is telling. That the majority do not support Leon Walker means that it isn’t about following a person, if you ask me. All in all, the preceding questions make you come to the inevitable conclusion that “Divided also is where congregants will go if the UCG splits. A slim majority will leave.”
Question: Will UCG leadership heed this any better than it has anything else up until now?
I mean, if they won’t listen to a sizable portion of their own ministry …
Wait a second, that's hardly a representative poll. The demographics are highly skewed and the sample would be too small to be taken seriously.
@Anonymous: You could say that about any poll on any blog, though. None of them would adhere to the strict definition of being a scientific poll.
True, but "Will UCG leadership heed this any better than it has anything else up until now" you are using it as something credible that the admin should be paying attention to.
I'm not naive. There are big problems in UCG. I took the poll also yesterday but I doubt that UCG will lose 50% of the members, at least in the initial split. I'm more worried about attrition over time as congregations are left without adequate leadership.
@Anonymous: Actually, everything I've seen indicates about a 40-60 split. Of course, a good number of those are already gone.
Come on Mr. Carmack… I have read you for a while. Have a little journalistic integrity. Do you really think UCG people go to shadows for their information much less enter their polls? There is certain demographic that does, and the majority of them distrust anyone, that is all that can be derived. You have to consider who they attract before placing any credibility on their poll. Now if you could say that all those who voted were UCG members… it might make a difference. And I agree that 70 votes is far too small a sampling even if they were all UCG members. Does this little poll really disturb you? Wait until the final tally of God fearing ministers and members leave UCG… now that is something to be disturbed about.
@Anonymous: I came up with the 40-60 split before the Shadows poll even existed.
Actually what is disturbing is that on every side we see basically the same ratios, no matter who asks it, yet the current UCG leadership continues on as though nothing is amiss.
My own personal guesstimate was that roughly half the people who hung out at UCG meetings were actually wicked. The other half were not so bad, but certainly not hot either, just lukewarm at best. This was not what I wanted to see, but what I did see. This observation was made about ten years ago. Most likely, things will have gotten even worse, as that was clearly the trend even back then.
One problem with all the current splintering is that it tends to remove the ability to do any kind of great work on the world scene, either preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God to the whole world or the Ezekiel warning message to the modern descendants of the ancient Israelites (USA, Canada, Britain, Australia, democracies of NW Europe).
The WCG under HWA was certainly not perfect, and there were always problems, but with one large group of 150,000 people all working together as a team, a powerful, unified message was able to be delivered to the whole world. Too bad that sometimes the message was another wrong guess about just exactly when the end of the age would come (1940's, 1975, 1996).
Someone looking at all the splintering today will see a bunch of badly behaved people who cannot get along with each other.