From: wolda002@umn.edu
Date: Mon Jul 13 2009 - 12:19:00 EDT
Ensign's 'C Street House' Owned By Group Touting Plans For Christian World
Control
42 COMMENTS
By Bruce Wilson, Talk To Action
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/http://www.talk2action.org//141256/
Most recently covered by MSNBC's Rachel Maddow (1, 2), Washington D.C.'s "C
Street House" has over the past two weeks become the center of a media
firestorm. Along with GOP Senator Tom Coburn, sex-scandal embroiled GOP
leaders Senator John Ensign and South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford have
been tied to the row house, assessed to be worth 1.84 million dollars,
which is registered as a church and provides Washington politicians with
substantially lower than market rate rent. Coburn and Ensign have lived at
the C Street house, while Sanford has participated in its Bible study
group.
Editor's Insertion: The following is a partial transcript from Maddow's
show on the C Street House:
If you consult this building’s financial paper trail, you will find that
it’s actually considered to be a church. That designation makes “C
Street” a convenient tax-free haven for the secretive organization that
runs it, an organization known as “The Family.” It also makes for some
awkward tax and income questions for the at least five, probably seven,
members of Congress who live at the house in exchange for what appears to
be substantially low market rent. ...
The "C Street house is a former convent. It's used as a sort of subsidized,
really upscale dorm for members of Congress who are associated with this
powerful, poorly understood religious group.
The Family and the house at C Street have ended up reluctantly in the
headlines now because of the two major politician sex scandals that are
embroiling the Republican Party this summer, and that have taken two of
their reported 2012 presidential hopefuls out of political contention.
Embattled Nevada Senator John Ensign lives at the C Street house.
The husband of Senator Ensign’s mistress says that prominent members of
the family, including sons of the group’s founders ... were both aware of
Ensign’s secret affair and were involved in his efforts to pay off the
mistress and her family...." [End transcript]
According to the Washington Post the house is owned by Youth With a Mission
D.C. Youth With a Mission is one of the most extensive Christian
fundamentalist para-church organizations on Earth, and YWAM founder leader
Loren Cunningham has publicly outlined a vision for Christian
world-control.
In a 2008 promotional video, "Reclaiming 7 Mountains of Culture", Loren
Cunningham describes a vision he shared along with the late Campus Crusade
For Christ founder Bill Bright and late Christian theologian Francis
Schaeffer, in which Christian fundamentalists could achieve world
domination by taking over key sectors of society such as business,
government, media, and education.
Francis Schaeffer is widely credited as one of the most influential
theologians of the 20th Century Christian right. Among the myriad
ministries of Bill Bright's behemoth Campus Crusade For Christ is the
Washington D.C. ministry Christian Embassy that targets Pentagon leaders
for evangelizing.
The C Street House is run by a secretive Washington ministry known as The
Family, or The Fellowship. Over the past year and a half, The Family has
gradually come to public attention, mainly due to journalist and Harpers
contributing editor Jeff Sharlet's ground breaking book The Family: The
Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power. The Family runs the
yearly National Prayer Breakfast and maintains a network of Capital Hill
prayer groups which have enjoyed the participation of both top GOP but also
top Democratic Party Congress and Senate members.
The Family runs but does not own the C Street House. According to a June
26th, 2009 Washington Post story, by Manuel Roig-Franzia, "The Political
Enclave That Dare Not Speak Its Name: The Sanford and Ensign Scandals Open
a Door On Previously Secretive 'C Street' Spiritual Haven", the C Street
House is owned by a "little-known organization called Youth With a Mission
of Washington DC."
Youth With a Mission is a global Christian evangelical organization founded
in 1960 which, declares YWAM, is "currently operating in more than 1000
locations in over 149 countries, with a staff of nearly 16,000."
As Cunningham introduces Reclaim 7 Mountains of Culture, "It was August,
1975... and the Lord had given me, that day a list of things that I had
never thought about before. He said, 'This is the way to reach America, and
nations, for God.' "
The video continues with a narrator who declares, "In every city of the
world, an unseen battle rages for dominion over God's creation and the
souls of people. This battle is fought on seven strategic fronts, looming
like mountains over the culture, that shape and influence its destiny. Over
the years, the church slowly retreated from its place of influence on these
mountains, leaving a void now filled with darkness. When we lose our
influence, we lose the culture and when we lose the culture we fail to
advance the kingdom of God. And now, a generation stands in desperate need.
It's time to fight for them and take back these mountains of influence."
Reclaim 7 Mountains of Culture then outlines seven areas of influence for
Christian fundamentalists to reclaim:
The Mountain of Government, "where evil is either restrained or
endorsed",
The Mountain of Education, "where truths, or lies, about God and his
creation are taught.",
The Mountain of Media, "where information is interpreted through the
lens of good or evil",
The Mountain of Arts and Entertainment, "where values and virtue are
celebrated or distorted",
The Mountain of Religion, "where people worship God in spirit and
truth, or settle for a religious ritual",
The Mountain of Family, "where either a blessing or a curse is passed
onto successive generations and,
The Mountain of Business, "where people build for the glory of God or
the glory of man."
The last is the key mountain, proclaims the video: "those who lead this
mountain influence what controls our culture."
Youth With a Mission also runs a global Christian evangelism educational
ministry headquartered at the University of the Nations 45 acre campus in
Kona, Hawaii.
As one example in which organizations such as YWAM are implementing the
Reclaiming the 7 Seven Mountains agenda, the university has developed
programs to provide its students with real world skills such as media and
film production.
One of the graduates from the Kona university is Loren Cunningham's son,
David Loren Cunningham, who founded the Film Institute in 2004 with other
University of Nations students, to place students in the film industry in
order to transform Hollywood from within. Cunningham directed Path to 911,
the controversial television film aired on ABC on September 10 and 11, 2006
and covered at The Huffington Post by journalist Max Blumenthal.
Bruce Wilson writes for Talk To Action, a blog specializing in faith and
politics.
© 2009 Talk To Action All rights reserved.
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http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/http://www.talk2action.org//141256/