The latest issue of The Journal: News of the Churches of God is devoted in large part to Ron Dart, who recently died after a long period of ill health. I can recollect few if any other figures in the Church of God movement who have been held in this kind of regard across the fractures, and frankly stated, there will likely be few if any who will be so regarded in the future. As Ian Boyne notes, "No matter how cynical, you could not help but be impressed..."
Brian Knowles, a former Plain Truth editor, has also written in this issue about his friend, the late David Jon Hill.
A PDF of the issue is available to download.
Yes. The Ron Dart memorial issue. Collector's item.
ReplyDeleteIf you care for that sort of thing.
Well I'm not impressed by Ron Dart.
ReplyDeleteMaybe he could be excused for ignoring 300 years of scholarship and remaining a Fundamentalist if he lived in Mayberry, or across the county line in Hickory Hollow, or even Choctaw Ridge? - or anywhere within 100 miles of the 'Buckle of the Bible Belt'[Dallas] - for instance, East Texas - oh wait, he did!
The best we could say of Ron Dart is that perhaps he was less bad. I'd credit his slightly different perspectives to his pre-AC theology studies. Surely his passing will have a further diminishing effect on the Armstrong movement. If there are any Armstrongites on planet earth in 2075, they'll probably resemble the Ron Dart mold more than that of the founder.
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It has been my limited experience that Baptists are pretty good at teaching their people Scriptures, unlike many Methodist congregations. So I am a bit surprised to hear that he had that background. Didn't Richard Plache, one of the better instructors at AC Pasadena, also have some formal training in Theology from a mainstream educational institution? I can say that I had an excuse for being sucked in for four years, I seldom attended Church other than Easter (occasionally) so when I heard GTA in 67-68, he made sense to me. But Plache and Dart? My wife, who I met at AC, was a longtime, faithful church attender. When she broke off her engagement to someone and decided to head off to Pasadena, neither her parents or pastor could explain to her why HWA was running a cult. Good thing for me, though. Meeting her was well worth four years in a cult. Fortunately for us, we both left at the same time and were in agreement over the controversies. A big thanks goes to Ernest Martin, who at the time, was publishing some good articles on tithing, etc.
ReplyDeleteSo Ron Dart was a nice person and a good teacher. But he was a part of a very corrupt organization. He was a leader in it. When he left GTA's organization, he cited health problems as his reason for leaving (right when another sex scandal was hitting the organization). Wasn't he one of many who turned a blind eye to a lot of bad stuff, collected his paycheck and had a career? Not as bad as most in character and personality, a very good teacher, but no Martin Luther.