David Hulme and the Hulmerless Church of God Terminating Ministers and Losing Members

Another Church of God is having ministerial problems resulting in terminations resignations.  It seems that David Hulme's little personalty cult is having a rough time right now.  Ministers are leaving and taking members with them. 

Since Hulme's little group was never large, it is going to hit the pocket book of grandiose Dave really hard.  He has always thought of himself as something better than the rest of the world.  The Church of God has never had an minister as puffed up with intellectual snobbery as it has had with Dave. Maybe it's time that facade comes crashing down and he has to live like the lowly members he has sucked dry over the decades.

Malm had this up the other day:

Prominent ministers have been fired (resigned is their word for it) and brethren have left, resulting in declining income; while many more are deeply dissatisfied with David Hulme.  
 

David is an evangelical masquerading as one of the called out, and David Hulme has always been only about David Hulme, even when I knew him in WCG in the 80′s.  In the nineties David’s reckless spending on personal projects drove UCG to the edge of bankruptcy.

Hulme has had many issues over the years with ministers leaving hsi group, and rightly so.  Here are the points one minister bought up when he left:

Some indication of the unhappiness of John Meakin and ex-COGIC members can be garnered from studying David Hulme's church and personal websites.

♦ There is no attempt to preach the gospel to the world (Mark 16:15), even within the church's quarterly Vision magazine, which is the public's only acces to the church's teachings. In the Fall 2011 issue, a reader writes: "I have seen a recurrent theme presented and most recently stated .... that the church today as we know it bears very little resemblance to the church Jesus established. I have read this same basic statement many times .... I have yet to read any solid definition of how the church today should look and act according to Vision's writers."
 ♦ Contact with members of other church groups is actively discouraged. Only church members and other financial supporters can gain access to the church web site.
♦ David Hulme promotes himself, and not the church,  posting his personal profile on various websites dedicated to business professionals, such as the  Linkedin network, where "you can find potential clients ... be found for business opportunities ... search for great jobs ..."

Perhaps it was via these web pages that he was able to obtain work at the Media Relations Summit 2008, where he gave a lecture in Increasing Traffic to Your Corporate Website. In the Autumn/Winter of 2008-9 he lectured in Middle East Politics at the University of Southern California.

♦ David Hulme's profile on Linkedin (shown below in red type) lists his recent work experience as :

1977 — 1979

Circulation Manager (Africa) of Quest Magazine

(Writing & Editing Industry)

David Hulme added this entry in 2010. Although Quest was owned by the Worldwide Church of God, TIME magazine described it as: "nonetheless thoroughly secular. [Herbert] Armstrong gave editorial control to Robert Shnayerson, 55, a former TIME senior editor and Harper's editor in chief, who dedicated the magazine to what he called 'the pursuit of excellence' in fields as diverse as mountain climbing and genetic research."
1986 — 1995

Vice-President of Ambassador Foundation

(Non-Profit Organization, Management industry)

Supervision of Ambassador Auditorium's performing arts program

This foundation was also a secular part of the Worldwide Church of God.

David Hulme's highest profile role was as a presenter of the church's religious TV program, The World Tomorrow, but he seems not to want to admit having worked for this church.

Joseph Tkach,  leader of the Worldwide Church of God after the death of Herbert Armstrong in 1986, soon began to transform its fundamental doctrines. David Hulme was a leading advocate for the doctrinal changes,  as the Director of Public Relations. However, growing opposition to these changes by the majority of members, and their desire for a new church that would retain the former doctrines, prompted him at the last minute to attend the conference that would form the United Church of God in 1995.

1995 — 1998

President of the United Church of God.

Again, he prefers not to have a church association in his personal profile.

David Hulme is highly intelligent and possesses superb presentational skills, but knowing his previous role in Worldwide, why did the majority of ministers vote for David Hulme to be President?

In 1998 he was removed as President by United's Council of Elders for excessive and unauthorized spending, which had plunged United into serious debt.

He then left United, drawing away many members to his new church, the Church of God—an International Community, where he would have the full control that he felt he ought to have had as President of United.

 

But is it a church? Not according to his personal profile.
1998 — Present

President of Vision Media

(Privately held, Marketing and Advertising Industry)

♦ He changed this entry in 2010 from Writing & Editing — now he's in Marketing and Advertising?

Although the large outlay necessary to publish the lavish quarterly journal Vision is provided by the tithes and offerings of members and other financial supporters of COGIC, David Hulme considers Vision to be his magazine -his personal website link in the Linkedin profile page will take you to the Vision magazine website.
1990 — 2003

Education: MA, Ph.D International Relations

Specialized in Middle East and Foreign Policy

♦ The web site www.vision.org proclaims as its purpose: "Vision examines the historical and philosophical origins of current social issues and explores ways to restore peace of mind to our daily lives."

Vision Foundation International was launched in 2010, ostensibly with the mission to assist communities in developing countries to find practical solutions "to improve their physical, mental and spiritual resources, by supporting sustainable humanitarian and educational programs."

However, Vision Foundation International states that donations will be used for:♦ providing support for Vision Media Publishing, which publishes the international quarterly journal Vision—Insights and New Horizons;♦ providing support to Vision Media Productions, an independent TV production company, to produce documentaries on historical, social and environmental issues;♦ providing funding for documentaries which examine the historical and philosophical origins of current issues;♦ supporting and producing conferences which examine complex issues from a cross-disciplinary viewpoint by bringing together scholars and experts from various fields of study.

From: David Hulme's "VISION"