And Great was the Fall thereof

Definitely worth the "full screen" option. Only a few seconds long. Check out Gary's post also.

It's just a facade, and it always was

Gary has posted further pictures of the demolition at the former Ambassador College on the Banned by HWA blog. Of the Hall of Administration, he notes;

"This was the seat of the power that controlled the church and established doctrines. It was also the seat of those that abused the members so terribly. It's fitting that this is the last building to be demolished."

The photograph here was posted on FB by Wes White. It shows the facade of the Hall of Admin still standing, awaiting the final indignities.

Facade: a deceptive outward appearance."her flawless public facade masked private despair" synonyms: show, front, appearance, false display, pretence, simulation, affectation, semblance, illusion, posture, pose, sham, fake, act, masquerade, charade, guise, mask, cloak, veil, veneer "a facade of laughing bonhomie"

There's got to be a parable in that.

Demolishing the Dream

Gary Leonard has been posting photographs of the ongoing demolition on the former Ambassador College campus (see here and here). I can't help thinking about all those other photographs that graced church publications in former times (check out the old This is Ambassador College booklet, available as a PDF). A beautiful campus that was supposed to be a foretaste of what the whole world would be like in the 'world tomorrow'. As the preacher says in Ecclesiastes, "vanity of vanities".

For anyone who's even faintly interested, Ronnie Weinland, date-setter extraordinary and one of the Two Witnesses (the other is his wife!), is now out of prison. He had been in a halfway house since December, and was permitted during that time to preach to members of his designer sect, Church of God - Preparing for the Kingdom of God (COG-PKG). Not that he's quite as free as a bird; he's on three years supervised release. More information on Mike's Weinland blog.

Finally, on a sad note, Almon McCann, known to many simply as Corky, has died. Corky was a frequent commenter on a number of ex-WCG sites. He had past associations not only with the Worldwide Church of God, but also the Christadelphian movement. Some years ago he established his own blog that dealt with both fundamentalist sects. In more recent times that blog (now called ex-Christadelphians) has taken on new writers, but I'll keep the original link on the blog roll (Corky's blog) in the meantime. John Bedson's tribute to Corky can be found here.

Bulldozing date for campus buildings

Townhouses will replace Ambassador College offices and classrooms: LA Times story.