NZ Cults & Religious Groups List: T

Hot picks: Brian Tamaki, Theophostic Counseling, Theosophy/Theosophical Society, Tithing, Eckhart Tolle, Transcendental Meditation

T

Tai Chi. Chinese form of exercise characterised by its slow and fluid movements. Sometimes called "meditation in motion." Submissions for this listing are now being accepted. Please see the Contact page.

Tamaki, Brian. Pentecostal Brian Tamaki is the pastor of Destiny Church in Auckland and former pastor of Lake City Church in Rotorua. Senior pastor and self-proclaimed apostle for Destiny Churches International. As of February 2005 Brian Tamaki is being called a bishop - the first bishop in Destiny. The title was formally bestowed on him at the 7th anniversary celebrations in July 2005. Brian Tamaki can also be regarded as a false prophet, along with and his "spiritual father" self-proclaimed Bishop Eddie L Long, since in around October 2003 they claimed that Destiny would be ruling New Zealand.

Last year Tamaki told his followers: "I predict in the next five years, by the time we hit our 10th anniversary - and I don't say this lightly - that we will be ruling the nation."

On that same night Tamaki joined forces with Bishop Eddie L Long, senior pastor of the New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Atlanta, USA.

Tamaki said the self-appointed bishop was his spiritual father.

Long blessed Destiny's vision that it will be ruling New Zealand before its 10th anniversary.

"He made a declaration that in five years you shall be ruling and reigning in this nation," Long told the Destiny Church.

"That means you control the wealth, that means you control the riches, that means you control the politics, that means you control the social order, that means that you are in charge."

Tamaki says his prediction is no slip of the tongue but a prophetic utterance.

While the November 2008 general election would have been an ideal time for the prophecy to be fulfilled, nothing came of it. There has been not other fulfillment; hence the prophecy is clearly false. Brian Tamaki and his wife Hannah present Destiny Television. In August 2002 he used his television program as a platform for launching broadside attacks on denominational churches."Vipers in the Church" dealt with the pharisaism (?sp) rampant in all other churches. On Sunday, TV1, in October 2004, Brian Tamaki said "Well, the Bible doesn't call you to be poor. I mean, why would I want to be a Christian if it says you're going to be poor and poverty stricken? That's just the opposite of what the Bible speaks." No, Brian, the Bible doesn't speak that, and "Because you want to do only what God wants and to spend eternity in Heaven with Him" is the answer to your question. Submissions for this listing are now being accepted. Please see the Contact page. If you are a Destiny Church member who has been told to write to us, please don't bother. We already know you are required to defend Brian Tamaki.

Tamariki, Brian. Brian Tamariki is the fictitious pastor of the satirical Density Church supposedly based in Auckland.

Tara Centre. Linked to the New Age cult Masters of Wisdom.

Tarot cards. (Pronounced "tarro.") A set of cards used to supposedly read fortunes. Very occult.

Tauranga House of Prayer. Offers a rather expensive 12 week live-in course called Awaken Internship. Probably founded by YWAM as a branch of the International House of Prayer in Kansas City (Kansas, USA), and thus likely part of the New Apostolic Reformation. It is nothing to do with the House of Prayer in Atlanta (Georgia, USA). Connected with Bethlehem Mission Trust. For some concerns about the International House of Prayer see Dan Edelen's article Charismatic Churches and the Cult of the New where he writes about discernment in the Charismatic Movement and identifies at least 3 (and as many as 5) of 7 warning flags.

Tax Reduction Integrity Movement. Aka TRIM. Front group for the cult Zenith Applied Philosophy (ZAP).

The Church in Rotorua. Christian sect. The Rotorua branch of the Local Church of Witness Lee (10 Helena Place, Westbrook, Rotorua). The almost arrogant sounding name ("The Church..." - as if there's only one, of any denomination) dates back to Witness Lee's mentor Watchman Nee believing that there should be only one church per city. Distribute the Recovery New Testament for free. Strong links to Bibles For New Zealand.

The Church in [city name]. The Local Church of Witness Lee names its branches after the name of the city the church is in. Don't confuse The Church in [wherever] with the church (small c) in [wherever].

The Family International. Cult, formerly known as Children of God. Founded by David Berg is the USA in 1968. Unknown arrival date in New Zealand, they are believed to have a branch in Mangere, Auckland. See Watchman Fellowship's The Family profile for more information.

The Glory Realm conference. False revival movement conference held in 2008, in association with Fusion church.

Theophostic Counseling/Theophostic Prayer Ministry. A method of (supposedly) Christian counseling developed by Dr Ed Smith of Kentucky, USA. From the Greek theo "God" and phos "light or illumination." Used in the Beyond Tolerable Recovery training course. The emphasis is on genuine recovery rather than just "tolerable" recovery, which might be gradual, involve relapses, etc, and is based on the idea that many of our problems are (supposedly) caused by lie-based thinking, that episodes in our past that have led to present problems - not unlike the engrams of Scientology. (For example being told "you're fat" as a young child leading to bulimia much later in life. As soon as the person recalls the possibly deeply repressed memory of being told the lie and recognises they were not fat and they don't need to believe that lie any more, they can allegedly be instantly freed from bulimia.)

Theophostic Counseling is far from controversy-free - for example, there are well-supported claims that when misused the Theophostic techniques can lead to recovered memory syndrome and other serious problems. The techniques themselves appear very easy to misuse and this seems to have been recognised by Ed Smith, who significantly revised his course material to specifically try to avoid some of the biggest problem areas, such as guided imagery and directed visualisation. Sadly, this rewrite does not prevent practitioners from ignoring Dr Smith's directions and continuing to misuse the techniques, and has not addressed theological problems inherent in the teachings. Incidently Ed Smith doesn't care if recovered memories are true, instead focusing on the pain those memories cause. This is a serious concern in itself.

Also, the Theophostic Counseling techniques do not appear to be biblically sound. For example, looking at things at a simple level, Jesus told us to pray to the Father (not to himself, Jesus), and also that the Holy Spirit would be our Counselor (again, not himself, Jesus). In Theophostic theology the concept of a sinful nature apparently doesn't exist and personal accountability for sin is deminished (since sinful deeds are ultimately caused by bad things happening to people in the past), while salvation (healing) comes from within - a highly New Age concept. Dr Gary Almy, MD, highlights some of the strongly New Age theology with quotes from Ed Smith:

... sanctification "is not a process of becoming more like Jesus because we are already as much like Jesus as we will ever be," but is "a revealing of what already is" ...

Ed Smith has also taught that Christians can be possessed/inhabited by demons (not just oppressed by them), and associates truth subjectively with what works and what feels right, instead of objectively with what reflects reality. Dr Gary Almy quoting Ed Smith again:

He is not concerned with and openly devalues "logic" as getting in the way of the search for insight into the unconscious and makes such statements as: "I do not ask how true it logically may be, but rather how true does it feel"; "You do not want them to reason out the truth/lie or use their logic" ...

However, the Bible places a high importance on the active use of our mind (quotes from NIV):

Matt. 22:37-38
Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. (Emphasis added.)
2 Timothy 1:7
For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.
1 Timoth 1:4-7
As I urged you when I went into Macedonia, stay there in Ephesus so that you may command certain men not to teach false doctrines any longer nor to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies. These promote controversies rather than God’s work — which is by faith. The goal of this command is love, which comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. Some have wandered away from these and turned to meaningless talk. They want to be teachers of the law, but they do not know what they are talking about or what they so confidently affirm.
1 Timothy 6:20-21
Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to your care. Turn away from godless chatter and the opposing ideas of what is falsely called knowledge, which some have professed and in so doing have wandered from the faith. Grace be with you.

Theophostic teachings adds to the teachings of the Bible, which is deemed insufficient for God to heal through. The Bible again:

2 Timothy 3:16-17
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. (Emphasis added.)

It also appears Theophostic theology leads to a distortion of the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, and a certain spiritual blindness, as those heavily involved with it are just concerned with (the power of) seeing results, not with whether the methods are godly.

The Lying Spirits web site raises the question Where does scripture say the work of the Holy Spirit is to produce, on demand, an encounter with a spirit Jesus for the purpose of illuminating past memories? Meanwhile, Anton Hein of Apologetics Index calls it Inner Healing repackaged: Not surprisingly, inner healing is a New Age concept used in one way or another in many different New Age and Eastern religions. The NZ Cult List asks: If the techniques are godly why does God honour the New Age with their successful use therein? If the techniques are not godly why are Christians using them? If the techniques are occuring naturally rather than spiritually how can Christians using them bring glory to God through their use when the source of healing is falsely credited?

Theophostic Counseling is rated Danger for its non-biblical, extra-biblical, and very strongly New Age teachings. For those interested in conducting more research into Theophostic Counseling, more information may be found:

Apologetics Index's Theophostic Counseling article.
The Lying Spirits web site.
A Biblical Evaluation of Theophostic Ministry (PDF, 60KB) by the Staff of Community Evangelical Free Church, Elverson, Pennsylvania.
Christian Research Institute's Evaluation of Theophostic Prayer Ministry (PDF, 540KB).
Dan Edelen's article Charismatic Churches and the Cult of the New where he writes about discernment in the Charismatic Movement and identifies 5 of 7 warning flags in Theophostic Counseling.

We recognise that Theophostic Counseling has apparently helped many people but we recommend that people do NOT engage in Theophostic ministry (small m) - either receiving or practicing - until they have read either the Lying Spirits ebook (PDF, 2.1MB) or one of the two evaluation PDFs linked to above, and Dan Edelen's article.

There may be a link between Theophostic Ministry and spiritual apathy, and we'd like to look into this further. To make a submission about this please see the Contact page.

Theosophy/Theosophical Society. Cult. Founded by Helena Petrovna Blavatski in New York around 1875. Annie Besant followed Madame Blavatski as leader. Other early leaders were Colonel Henry Steele Olcott and William Q Judge. Theosophy holds the motto "There is no religion higher than truth" but doesn't teach the truth. Watchman Fellowship lists Theosophy as teaching "pantheism, reincarnation, striving for Christ-consciousness, and occult and paranormal phenomena." For more information see the Skeptic's Dictionary entry for Theosophy.

Thoughtstorm. Trademark of Avatar Masters Training.

Tithing. See tithing in the Glossary.

Toastmasters. A secular organisation for the practice of public speaking. No cult connections.

Tolle, Eckhart. Eckhart Tolle is a New Age writer, the latest fashionable thing according to some. Author of The Power of Now. Supports many New Age beliefs, including meditation.

Toronto Blessing, Toronto Movement. See Holy Laughter Movement.

Towner, Lynne. Lynne Towner is the founder of the New Zealand Spiritual School. FYI listing.

Transcendental Meditation. A New Age practice. A dangerous form of empty-your-mind meditation started by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, and made popular by association with the Beetles (music group). For more information see the History page in the Closeup on the New Age.

Transmission Meditation. A New Age practice. Supposedly a method used by the Masters of Wisdom to spread good vibes through willing subjects.

TRIM. Acronym for Tax Reduction Integrity Movement. Front group for the cult Zenith Applied Philosophy (ZAP).

Trinity. Character in the cult movie The Matrix. For the Christian doctrine see the Trinity entry in the Glossary.

Truth Watch. Christian apologetics-oriented group in Wellington. They run a web site.

TTTM Religion. While claiming to blend science (including evolution) with religion it actually fails at being scientific, and in embracing pluralism it fails religiously.

Tui Spiritual & Educational Trust, Tui Community. A community in Wainui Bay, near Takaka in Golden Bay, founded in 1984. PredominantlyBuddhist beliefs. The homepage of their web site quotes Rudolf Steiner, founder of the Anthroposophical Society cult.

Turning Point. A course based on Landmark Education's Landmark Forum, and run in Australia by People Knowhow. The course has apparently led to the death of a woman in Australia - see here and here.

Tvind. Cult, strong mind control. Also known as Humana, front groups include College for International Cooperation and Development and One World Volunteers Institute. The name Tvind is from a farm where the cult was started in the late 1960s in Denmark by Mogens Petersen. He went underground in 1979 and has not been seen outside the organisation since then. According to the New Zealand Herald "It is an empire, with schools, colleges, 'charities,' trading companies, volunteer networks and national organisations in many countries." They run humanitarian aid programmes where volunteers have to pay thousands of dollars in advance. The money is not spent in accommodating the volunteers. In 1983 Danish journalists estimated the Tvind-funded empire to be worth $15 billion.

Twelve Step Method, Twelve Step Program. The main technique of Alcoholics Anonymous, Emotions Anonymous, Narcotics Anonymous, etc.

Two by Twos. See Cooneyites.