This is the second post in review of the book,   “One Last Kiss” written by Michael Cuneo. (Copyright©2012 by Michael Cuneo, St. Martin’s Press, ISBN 978-0-312053972-6) The subtitle reads “The True-Story of a Minister’s Bodyguard, His Beautiful Mistress, and a Brutal Triple Homicide.”  The first post is found here: “One Last Kiss” by Michael Cuneo – https://religiouscultsinfo.com/?p=5265

The book outlines the story of Chris Coleman who grew up in a home where the father was a pastor. After a career in the military, this young man landed a job with a very prominent ministry.  Chris would later be convicted of murdering his wife and two sons apparently in hopes of taking up with his new girl friend. We ended the previous post describing Chris Coleman, the convicted murderer, and his attitude: “He believed he occupied a special spiritual class. That what counted for sin for other people didn’t count as such for him. And as far as disabusing him of these delusions over the years, his parents likely only would have strengthened them.” (page 318 emphasis added) This post will review the author’s ideas on the development of this attitude of being in “a special spiritual class” and its consequences.

Cuneo tells the background of Ron and Connie Coleman. Ron graduated high school and went to work in the mines after a year in college. They would marry and Connie had Chris March 20, 1977. They also had two sons after that. The Colemans became involved in the Methodist church and eventually would end up in the First Baptist Church in Chester, Illinois. “They then began to attend a prayer meeting that would fundamentally alter their lives.” (page 21) The prayer meetings were for those who “had grown dissatisfied with the worship services at the church..” (page 22) The meetings were held in the home of a doctor and were very successful. Eventually, there was a church group that formed out the prayer meetings and Ron would become pastor of that church several years later. As I read this I could not help but remember the story of Gerald and Linda Southerland in Johnston, SC. Their pastoral careers also began in similar fashions stemming from the Charismatic Renewal period as it came to be called. Ron left the mines as Gerald left the textile mills. Ron and Connie would follow Joyce Meyer Ministries. Gerald and Linda followed Kenneth Hagin and Kenneth Copeland- among others. Grace Bible Church grew for the Coleman’s, as did Grace and Truth Fellowship for the Southerlands – for a while.

After Chris and Sheri were married and moved near his parents, the author tells of Connie Coleman’s efforts to convert Sheri to evangelical Christianity and her apparent success. He also quotes Connie as telling Shari’s mom; “But don’t you realize? Catholicism goes against the teachings of the Bible.” (page 31) Have you ever met pastors who have acted like this? This comment was made in the home of Sheri’s mother. Can you say- offensive?

It was in the next few paragraphs that I became shocked and at the same time intrigued. Here I will take liberty to quote extensively in order to lay the ground work for what I feel are some very telling similarities between Ron and Connie and Coleman of Grace Church and Sam and Jane Whaley of Word of Faith Fellowship (WOFF).

“Ron and Connie had apparently grown accustomed to having people brought under their control. Over the years, according to former members, they’d turned Grace Church into their own private fiefdom. They’d turned it into something resembling an authoritarian cult. 

The ex-members sat that it hadn’t started out this way. Somewhere along the line, however, Ron had gotten hungry for power. He’d insisted that churchgoers submit to him completely. He’d bridle at the slightest challenge to his authority, suggesting that disobeying him was tantamount to disobeying God. That anyone who dared to question him was in an obvious state of spiritual rebellion.

Ron ruled the church like a paranoid dictator, the ex-members say. He didn’t trust anyone. He was always on the lookout for signs of dissent among the flock. He’d insist that his hand-picked elders accompany churchgoers on even the most innocent of excursions, such as a bus trip to St. Louis for a show. And then he’d insist that the elders report back to him as soon as possible. The only catch here was that he apparently didn’t trust them much more than he trusted anyone else. On more than one occasion, he called elders into his office and berated them for not being sufficiently compliant to him.” (page 68-69)

We could stop here and camp for a while- right? Who does this sound like? Instead of pants- think of a dress, nice dress, many dresses and shoes and purses to match.  But, lest I digress, let me just make it plain. This Ron fellow sounds like he has been following Jane Whaley’s path or she followed his. Actually, I have no proof they ever talked. I can say with a relative degree of comfort, that this behavior was the result of being a self-appointed leader in position of perceived supreme, all encompassing, spiritual authority over church members justified by self-serving interpretation of passages of Scriptures, feelings and circumstances. Ron may have been asked to take the position of pastor, but, I doubt he was given supreme control. He had to work for that. Who could argue that Jane has not “worked” for her position? Just ask her, she will tell you about all the hard work in the beginning. Why – everyone had devils back then! We move on with more resource text.

Cuneo outlines several mechanisms used by Ron Coleman to keep his members in line. We will review a few of them. “One of these (mechanisms) was threatening them with outright expulsion. “This is my church,” he’d say. “If you don’t like it here, there’s the door. Don’t let it hit you on the butt on the way out.” (page 69) Well, Jane would never say “butt” in a public meeting, but, who has not heard similar sayings from the pulpit of WOFF? The attitude was the same, and as far as I know, when there are no visitors- it still is the same.

“Another mechanism, according to ex-church members, was old-fashioned fear. He’d apparently insist that Grace Church was the only true church and that anyone not fully in tune with its teachings—or its pastor—was putting their eternal salvation at risk. He’d back this up with stories of people who had left the church only to lapse into lives of terrible sin and despair.” (page 69)

It is here, I will quote from a recent article from the Charlotte Observer:

Word of Faith sees ‘persecution’ for ‘godly’ walk; critics see an abusive church- By Michael Gordon  mgordon@charlotteobserver.com By Michael Gordon The Charlotte Observer

Posted: Saturday, Nov. 17, 2012 (resource link- http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2012/11/17/3673039/word-of-faith-fellowship-sees.html#storylink=misearch

The article is very extensive and may require a post of its own to dissect. However, at the end Jane says of her accusers and former members:

“No longer does Jane Whaley fear for her church’s future. The Bible also tells us, she says, that those who bless God’s people will be blessed. And those who curse God’s people will be cursed. Word of Faith, she believes, is among God’s chosen few.    

The accusers? Well, that’s a different story. Several, Whaley says, have died of cancer.

She grieves for the rest, she says, because she knows what God has in store.”

So, to Ron and to Jane: if you have to cite the misery of others to validate your ministry- what does that say of your “ministry”?  If the downfall of others makes you feel superior and validated- you are the sick one.  We move on to a most familiar tactic apparently used by both Ron and Jane.

“Another was the threat of ostracism. People who departed the fold were apparently treated as total outcasts. They were cutoff entirely from friends and family members within the church, who weren’t permitted to acknowledge their existence. By some accounts, that meant shunning departed members even during casual encounters at the grocery store, the gas station and so forth.” (page 69) This similarity is too glaring to dispute.  These two leaders obviously had the same techniques and maybe even the same goals. Yet, the similarities keep coming.

“Hardly an eloquent presence in the pulpit at the best of times, Ron’s preaching seemed to have gotten progressively worse as his appetite for power grew. According to some ex-members, he’d sometimes resort to angry shouting and screaming.

They recalled that he also used to play the role of the reluctant prophet, thrust against his will into apposition of terrible responsibility. “Do you think I want this job?” he’d sometimes say, or words to the same effect. “I have no choice in the matter. God’s called me to it. He’s made me your pastor. He’s entrusted me with the care of your souls. So, of course, I have authority over you.” (page 70)

Wow- Has anyone else ever heard a similar bewailment out of “Jane THE Reluctant Prophetess Whaley”? I would chuckle if it weren’t so sad and sick. This tactic I find especially self-serving.

Why do I point out these similarities between Ron Coleman and Jane Whaley? I do this because it is setting the stage for what I believe will be an obvious conclusion. We see among other things that there are similar arrogant attitudes toward church members and those who have left each group. Cuneo will go on to make the case that this arrogance in Ron and Connie laid the foundation and was a prime seed bed for the attitude that Chris Coleman exhibited before, during, and after his murder trial. He was of “a special spiritual class.”  Can you see where he would have gotten the attitude?

I believe that Jane and Sam Whaley exhibit the same attitude of being in a “special spiritual class.” What does this say about the future of the “special children” coming out of WOFF? What does it say about those children who are closest to Jane and are afforded special privileges because they “walk in a higher place in God” than the other children (or adults) at WOFF? What will the future of these “ministers” include?

As I begin to close, I will recount what the author writes about Ron Coleman’s behavior after the murder conviction of his son.

“After Chris’s arrest, Ron reportedly stood before his congregation and issued an ultimatum: “Anybody who believes my son did this, leave my church right now.”  As the months passed, he pounded away at the subject. He proclaimed Chris’s innocence at almost every church service. He insisted Chris had had nothing to do with the murders. He said that anyone who thought otherwise was guilty of sinning against a righteous man, and therefore also against God.”

“How dare any of you think that Chris isn’t innocent,” he reportedly said. “Shame on you, How dare you.”

He forbid his flock to follow the case in the news media. He accused the beat reporters of lying…He reportedly said that Chris was born again, that he was a member of the holy elect. And that once the case came to trial, the judge would be cursed if he permitted him to be found guilty. Everybody involved in such a miscarriage of justice would be cursed.” (page 244-245)

Well, when he forbid his folks from reading the media or listening to the reports- he qualified as a control master as far as I was concerned. If he said his son was “a member of the holy elect”– the deception was/is complete. Here is the last quote from a very fascinating book.

“He (Ron) reportedly told his congregation that the guilty verdict was nothing less than the devil’s handiwork. That it was all part of a diabolical plan to persecute the church and sow doubt among the faithful.” (page 305) I remind you to refer back to the article quoted earlier from the Charlotte Observer.

Michael Cuneo did a wonderful job telling a very graphic, sad and tragic story. The main storyline was not the development of Chris’s mindset and psyche. But, his parent’s attitude was an important piece in understanding how a young man could come from an apparent “Christian home” and be able to rationalize such a heinous crime against his own flesh and blood! The religious rationalization that was so pervasive in Chris Coleman’s thinking appears as an obvious trait in the lives of Jane and Sam Whaley. Worse than that, the WOFF leadership and their children are subject to having the same attitude of belonging to “a special spiritual class…” God help us all.

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Please, take time to read the Terms of Use for this personal blog. As mentioned, for posts written by John Huddle, any information about WOFF is from his memories and recollections as perfect as that may be or not be. Scripture references are Amplified Version unless otherwise noted. (Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation ) This is post number 421.