(This is a new feature where I plan to post current developments related to the Chapel and the issues it's left its ex-members with.)

Dec. 31, 2011 - In the waning days of 2011, ex-Chapelites (and now, sadly, also their children) are still disfellowshipping those with unapproved views of the Chapel and closeting themselves away with their own views. Yesterday the previously existing Facebook CCBTC site, which was started by a "Chapel kid" (i.e., somebody who was a child of Chapel parents when the Chapel collapsed) was closed to the public by her, and membership is now by her approval only. It goes without saying that my friend Calvin T. and I were among the disfellowshipped and the unwelcome because we've both never been shy about saying we think the Chapel belief system, even the version retained by most ex-Chapelites today, is cultic and heretical. (Well, OK, I was kind of shy about saying so years ago, but Calvin eventually brought me around over the course of a few beer & burger sessions.)

So now there's not one but three Facebook CCBTC sites for ex-CCBTC members (not counting the original one which always was for the Chapel's Christian School students only). Calvin started an alternate named "Recovering from CCBTC." It's not for the faint of heart—it deals with issues of sexual abuse which occurred at the Chapel even before the era of "spiritual connections"—but at least you won't get banned there for saying the Chapel belief system is cultic and heretical.

Another ex-Chapel member named Bob Sackett created his own CCBTC alternate now called "Going on from CC&BTC." There, you'll get banned for saying the Chapel belief system is cultic and heretical. Sigh. At the Chapel it was no big deal to refer to other churches (namely, denominational ones) as dead, hypocritical, paganized, and full of false doctrine. Right? So what's the big deal, anyway, folks? There's not a double standard at work, is there?

Jan. 20, 2012 - It's hard to keep all the Chapel boards on Facebook straight anymore, much less keep up with them all, but a participant on Board 4 ("Going on from CC&BTC") has made the following observation of what I think must be Board 3 ("Recovering from CCBTC"), because Board 1 ("CCCS") is only for former students of Community Chapel Christian School Students and Board 2 ("CCBTC") recently disfellowshipped about 60 of the original 290 members, including yours truly, and is now closed to the public:

"Looks like the atheist are moving in 'over there.' How many times have I bellowed that you reap what you sow? To listen to a number of ex-Chapel people, one gets the impression that a small Bible study group in 1967 bought the Deja Vu in South Seattle and started a sex cult."

As an ex-member of the Chapel myself who still has friends and relatives who retain many Chapel attitudes and beliefs, therefore making me a very interested observer of the post-Chapel scene, this strikes me as inaccurate on a couple of counts.

First of all, the atheists have not moved in - at least not en masse, just one or two maybe. Mostly, the people who have moved in and who now largely dominate the board believe in God and Jesus in some sense, but increasingly disparage historic Christian doctrine and traditional church membership, much, in fact, like the namesake of all these boards, the late and lamented Community Chapel and Bible Training Center of Des Moines, Washington, once disparaged historic Christian doctrine and traditional church membership. Instead they believe in various self-made and self-centered religions. Most of these people, except for the explicitly anti-Christian ones, accept large parts of the Bible as valuable and true, though their ultimate source of authority appears to be their own mind and will. A number of ex-Chapelites are still participating because they can work with that approach - they find the rejection there of historic, orthodox Christianity as hypocrisy and dead religion very promising. One does indeed reap what one sows.

Secondly, they don't believe that a small Bible study group bought a Deja Vu and started a sex cult, in 1967 or at any other time. What they believe is that a false minister of the gospel deceived a large number of well-meaning but naive Christians with cultic teaching, and that, over the course of its history, he and a number of others in his organization sexually abused some of the most vulnerable and trusting of his followers. They further believe that fact ought not to be covered up, but rather that the stories of that abuse ought to continue to be told publicly, not only for the sake of the healing of the victims but also for the education of the public about the nature of such groups.