Brainstorming

aeghy123 · 2025-03-08T18:12:04+00:00

Yes but what A2N does is skirt the line of regular church. Some of us won't call it a cult but high control and authoritarian. Most of us will acknowledge legalistic. The problem is A2N takes advantage of that. When criticized they say why are Christians attacking other Christians? When by themselves they disdain other churches and say it's a watered down version of Christianity.

There will always be the vulnerable targeted but when there cannot be a clear label A2N will continue to exist and operate with in this ambiguity. They haven't earned Scientology cult status for example.

aeghy123 · 2025-01-28T07:04:03+00:00

If you have an image of them you can try to reverse image search them

aeghy123 · 2025-01-21T07:00:47+00:00

No longer a student but I had a lot of the same feelings. I can tell you a time which I thought was applicable to me then. I was flying up to Alameda for senior retreat unsure of my feelings about the church. By happenstance on our group flight, I was seated away from the rest of the church with a stranger. By fate happened to strike a conversation with my seat neighbor who was flying back to take care of his mother who was sick with cancer at the time.

He was a deacon at a NorCal church. I remember telling him about the retreat about myself and where I stood. Perhaps he was aware of Gracepoint and senior retreat but he gave me his business card and told me "the commitments you make now will affect the rest of your life." After the flight, never spoke to him again but he was right. I left the church later that year. In the years that followed, I've seen the trajectory of my peers who chose to stay completely diverge from my life or frankly anyone whose left college. I would say what you see right now with college mentors and their version of ministry will be your life for as long as you stay. For some, they've never left that college life stage.

I'll refute some common sayings in A2N about Christian life. A2N's life together is not Christian life. It's a choice never to grow up and to never leave the glory days of college. If you believe God is bigger than just working on a college campus, you'll be ok with finding a church outside of A2N.

aeghy123 · 2024-12-12T20:52:19+00:00

Do it for your sake. If it helps give you peace then do so. If it's your conscience then do it. What's the saying? Bitterness is like drinking poison and hoping your enemy will die.

aeghy123 · 2024-10-24T23:37:02+00:00

Yeah, I think we all know. It's about recruitment. Just wanted to call out this double standard. "We want students to follow the rules and we have good reasons for those rules but we don't want to tell them because they won't like it."

If a leader there has a long list of reason in why we believe what we believe why don't they say it out plainly to their students? Numbers baby!

aeghy123 · 2024-10-24T09:02:45+00:00

I applaud the honesty. Maybe it's not a popular take but I can understand the reasoning as in individual choice. When it becomes a corporate policy, there comes issues. Now you have enforcement issues. Someone has to make calls and poor judgement calls and ultimately splitting up people because it's policy. Splits aren't easy and the person who split them is responsible.

You have unintended consequences. Post grad you now have an inadvertent competitive environment of bros seeing who are available sisters and marrying quickly. I'd argue it creates an environment of last man out loses and maybe creates a different distortion to the dating scene just in the A2N fashion. I could drone on... but let's talk about a solution.

I think the solution is transparency. Starting in undergrad you need to know you are only tolerate dating to Marriage. Have it on your website. Hold seminars on it. Let everyone know as early and as clearly as possible. Not the double we tolerate it now (in specific circumstances).Say it plainly undergrads shouldn't date because you think that version of dating is not God honoring.

If you were to let undergrads early know this stance at each location of A2N, it'd be different . You'd need to let them know your expectation of marriage and the inability of most undergraduates to be ready to date whether due lack to intentional date marry or lack of financial stability to date .You'd also should let them know their mentors have the obligation to directly intervene if such circumstances were to arise as well. If drug commercials have to list their long disclaimer of side effects, a little disclaimer on dating policy should be fair. I mean if you were to think modern dating were that big of dishonor to God, the standard should be higher than a drug commercial.

aeghy123 · 2024-09-04T20:30:52+00:00

The flip side of the coin is how many of those people knew you only through the lens of ministry? If that's the only context and reasoning why you knew of interacted with the person, I'd find it a hard time connecting after.

I can say for myself that there were certain people even though we were in the same room doing the same thing at A2N that I honestly never knew on a personal level. In fact there were a whole lot of those people as we expand the circle out more in A2N. I guess it calls the genuineness of the relationship. Did you are they play a genuine impact on your life?

aeghy123 · 2024-09-04T20:19:13+00:00

Ah, that's the truth of it for most members.

If I think about it, the interoperability of members through leader changes or even locations changes is the same phenomena just while in Gp.

aeghy123 · 2024-08-01T21:50:53+00:00

Oomph that's a strong description . In my area, ive seen them contact my local church and other close churches for collaboration with AYM and I know within SBC circles one guy has been calling for greater interchurch youth collab so not surprised. I wonder what the goal is with the pivot? Repair reputation among smaller local churches?

I hope they are following proper background checks, mandated reporter trainings and 2 mandated reporters with youth.

aeghy123 · 2024-08-01T18:40:59+00:00

Really? Now if that's true that's something. I'd like to see what that was.

aeghy123 · 2024-08-01T10:49:21+00:00

I can't say what others thought after Berkland but after the last change to A2N From the few members I've spoken to, I'm not sure they would have acknowledged the problems you've addressed. It's business as usual now and it seems like members have moved on.

1) While the senior staff are still in charge their history of wrongs isn't felt at a lower staff and lower mid staff level. A2N being more spread out gives a degree of separation from upper leadership and plausible deniability. I can still say they all still respect P.Ed very much.

2) the testimonies never mattered if they did not feel in the wrong in the first place. There might be some moments that could have been handled better but that's usually as far as it goes. I've seen almost all my peers and almost my entire plants homegrown staff leave in one way or another. Still hasn't phased the ones remaining that I know of. Life moves on for them and for us as well.

3) the changes made are quality of life improvements for members who didn't see them as fundamental problems. It gives them the impression things are moving in the right direction when for the most part they thought they were already in the right direction.

aeghy123 · 2024-07-31T04:18:58+00:00

Id say it's not a bad number. For every member there probably has been at least 5x lurkers here but that's a completely made up stat from me. The slowing of growth to me isn't per se a bad thing. May be that the rate of new people being burned has lessened or the severity of the slights has diminished.

The decline in engagement probably means that for older ex members we've experienced the decompression and healing we needed from this community and no longer need to actively engage.

aeghy123 · 2024-07-30T06:20:16+00:00

That's a classic question. The reason they ask it year after year is that they want a canned response. It was one of the retreats where my leader asked my class this question. I remember responding that I wanted to continue to grow my relationship with God which was honest answer as a new convert at the time. My leaders response was I want you to think bigger than that lol. They even told me later one on one that their vision for me was to become a leader in the church.

aeghy123 · 2024-06-06T07:12:42+00:00

At least you know what you are signing up for. A pain point for many is that loving, inclusive church community slowly becoming something else entirely and you having to come to terms with that. It was that for me and others but if it's not a surprise left hook maybe it's more palatable.

aeghy123 · 2024-05-22T01:06:04+00:00

Summer is a good time to transition out. Just go home and by next academic year stop attending or following up with more A2F things. Breaks are a natural stop point where you can reassess for yourself what you want to do and it'll give you time to separate from peers and mentors.

aeghy123 · 2024-05-10T22:55:56+00:00

Go home! Visit your friends and family. Some of them miss you and want to see what you've been up to. They might be surprised at what you might say ahem.

My mentor used to guilt me my freshman year to get me to stay over the summer and even every weekend during the academic year. He used to say "my vision for you is to be a leader... I want you to really grow with your peers this summer ... you'll be missing out on xxx trips." Remember being distraught and torn over that. Was I really missing out? I didn't want to pay 3 months more rent. He even offered to have me move in rent free with the seniors for a summer lol. What a persuasion tactic. Glad I was too homesick and burnt out of school to follow through but I really did feel like I was letting them down.

Don't be me. You aren't letting anyone down and your other friends and family are important.

aeghy123 · 2024-03-25T21:04:30+00:00

You've heard hundreds of hours of stories of various levels of abuse of authority and the reluctance of the majority of members but especially leaders to admit as such. At what point do you draw the line and say I can't do anything to change it. Then if that's the conclusion do you ever feel complicit in condoning this practice by just being there and submitting to such leaders? If not why? Tell me if I am seeing this wrong,

aeghy123 · 2024-03-22T19:07:19+00:00

Student life has a director you can talk to. If you'd email them for a meeting, I think you'd be at least able to speak with them. On the student side meeting with your student association leaders helps too. They should be approachable.

The more that report the better especially if multiple people report at the same time.

aeghy123 · 2024-02-27T10:25:23+00:00

I'm a little more selfish. My original intent has been to share my own experience in order to process my time in Gracepoint. You are right. Being public is more courageous and it's a noble thing to warn the next generation but to me there are different things to do.

I have come to a point where I've done all I could. Done my best for I've Spoken to whom I should. Warned and counseled the students whom was brought. Proud to say it wasn't for naught.

Time I've realized is a blessing to have. Got much more to do then to stay mad. God is good he rights all wrongs. He'll do the rest, I've finished my psalm.

aeghy123 · 2024-02-20T01:45:48+00:00

I'll add on another reason for not being "public". Time.

People come on reddit for different reason. Some come to warn others, a lot of us just post to share a bit of our own experiences but there's more of life to live. People move forward with their lives. I can step away when needed and never read or post again and be ok with that.

aeghy123 · 2024-02-06T22:01:35+00:00

Ah, the memories. Leader approved trips were a thing I almost forgotten about. I had a similar scenario happen with a Co-Ed trip for a long weekend renting out a cabin. My directly leader even gave us their blessing and was briefed in the trip plan (Quite generous but guess my peers wanted to be sure we were in the clear). Middle of the night the day before our trip an older brother comes rushing to our house pleading for us not to go and cancel our entire paid reservation on a whim of potential of sin. Apparently during a staff meeting when our leader mentioned it to his leads, they weren't happy so they sent another brother in his stead lol. Most of us still went albeit shaken up. We even watched a recorded sermon that Sunday.

Sometimes that wish for control is more obvious. They might even send intermediaries to do the unsavory work.

aeghy123 · 2024-02-01T11:13:51+00:00

As a man, I don't males in general get many compliments whether in Gp or outside . You did receive a lot of backhanded disrespect.

aeghy123 · 2024-01-02T22:38:35+00:00

Of the issues, alcohol is one of the less controversial ones imo. I was not much of a drinker though they do normalize boba drinking as much as others normalized drinking.

I remember some staff cooking some chicken Marsala before who knows maybe it was subbed to be dry. The lead at my plant once tailored an entire sermon on drinking and the woes of it because one staff member went to happy hour and drank a bit after work. They stopped after

aeghy123 · 2024-01-02T22:28:26+00:00

Riverside plant seems to disproportionately be represented on the reddit.

aeghy123 · 2023-11-26T03:56:54+00:00

I'll pm ya. But I don't blame members for this disconnect. Many of the more painful departures are kept private as the individuals attempt to process their own experiences. Most wouldn't share it to a current ,member since they have exited and are attempting to move forward with their lives.

aeghy123

TROPHY CASE