Below are some questions regarding the worthiness of the Fellowship to be given your donations. The Fellowship's Pledge Drive Letter for 1998 is included at the end of this document.
Should you give to the Fellowship? If so, why? And if not, why not? Is the FEF a worthy cause at this point in time?
What does this FEF letter say? What does it NOT say, or avoid saying? The fact is that the FEF's letter says almost nothing. Its all filler. I'm sure Joe Liszka had a tough time writing it because there was so little that they could really talk about or wanted to talk about. But write it he did, and it is an excellent job of saying nothing.
Here is one: They need your contributions "to help The Fellowship achieve its mission of disseminating the teachings of The Urantia Book."
What does that mean? What does it say? How are they going to go about "achieving [the] mission of disseminating the teachings of The Urantia Book."? They don't say.
I know that last year such an FEF mission involved printing and distributing its own books, doing its own translations, and having a PERPETUAL PRINTING FUND. They made their pleas last year on this basis and others. This year they don't say. They just say they want your help to do something, "achieve the mission...etc."
By the way, what happened to the PERPETUAL PRINTING FUND? No, I don't mean the money, I mean the PROMISE of it, the promise of the word PERPETUAL. perpetual, adj. 1. Lasting for eternity. 2. Continuing or lasting for an indefinitely long time. 3. Instituted to be in effect or have tenure for an unlimited duration: a treaty of perpetual friendship. 4. Continuing without interruption.
-American Heritage CD Rom Dictionary
Maybe "perpetual" now means that the leadership of the FEF is going to take that money and give it to the Foundation in $10,000 increments, perpetually, for the Foundation's translations, which of course will not carry the Fellowship's name and address on them, just the Foundation's.
The letter continues: "This letter is an appeal for your understanding of the needs of the readership community of which you are a part."
Wow! "An appeal for your understanding of the needs of the readership community..." What does that mean? Am I mistaken or is that "non-speak"? What was said there? I can find no information whatsoever. It's just filler. Scarcely relevant quotes from the Bible and the UB are then provided to bolster the case, such as it is.
The "love-mission of bringing the message of the "Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Man" to the world" is then mentioned, but no mention is made of the recent 180 degree change of course that the Fellowship has just taken, throwing away in a fit of peace-appeasement 8 years of righteous struggle in one short meeting with the Foundation.
"...fostering "service" to our fellows..." is mentioned without any details or elaboration.
We are told that, "The Fellowship is dedicated to this mission of service -- of bringing the joy of the Urantia Papers to the world." How is the Fellowship going to do that? Through its webpage? Through giving $10,000 donations to the Foundation and promising never, ever, so help them God, to print the Revelation again?
What about our BOOKS? Our books! Let's print them and translate them and distribute them like God wants us to do and let the chips fall where they may. If the iniquitous and evil Foundation wishes to take us to law for spreading the Revelation in our own way, LET THEM. Let the evil be on them.
The Foundation actually NEEDS us to print the book. It will give them one final opportunity to make the correct moral decision in this matter, to show the world that they operate under Jesusonian principles. We should not deny them this chance to redeem themselves, to show publicly that they know and believe and practice the teachings of Jesus regarding going to law among ourselves, regarding "Forbid him not", etc., instead of what they have been doing for the past seven years, thumbing their nose at the Master with their evil lawsuits.
"Whole Life Expos" and "conferences" are mentioned in the FEF's letter. That's great, they are great, but is that us? Is that all we are about? Is that our niche in the affairs of the Urantia movement? Whole Life Expos?, -what one Foundation supporter derogatorily refers to as our "New Age Booth". When we sell a book at a Whole Life Expo, whose name and address is in it? The Fellowship's? No. When the book gets to the new reader's home and he reads it and shares it with his or her friends, it is the Foundation's name and address only that they find, not ours. We are not allowed to have our name and address in the Revelation and we are not allowed to have our own books. WE ARE NOT AUTHORIZED BY GOD. Only the Foundation is authorized, and those that they re-authorize in turn. You know, it's a POPE deal, a hierarchy that God has ordained on earth.
There is NOTHING in the Fellowship's letter below that makes a compelling case to give to them. They have abandoned the course they were on, the reasonable and righteous course that we all had come to support and expect. The leadership seems to be interested in doing what it wishes, regardless. Your money is needed, but not your opinion. "Send us your funds and we'll take care of the rest. Just stay out of the way."
I am not a huge fan of one-man, one-vote democracy, and I've never expected the Fellowship to be that way but I also don't think that the leadership should be able to do whatever it wants. It looks as though it took the Foundation 8 years, but they finally subverted the leadership of the Fellowship.
A while ago during the aftermath of the "love meeting" wherein the Fellowship gave the Foundation $10,000 (so the story goes) and promised that their recent publishing effort would be the "first and only Uversa Press edition of The URANTIA Book.", I mentioned the changing of course without consulting the members and was told possibly cynically though truthfully to "read the constitution" of the FEF. They can do what they want, apparently was the meaning.
All of the reasons for breaking away from the Foundation are still valid. Little has changed at the Foundation except for window dressing since the split. None of the Foundation's positions on anything is any different from what it was in 1989. They still assert that they and they alone have been appointed by God to manage the Revelation, that they and they alone can print the Revelation, decide how much to charge for it, decide how the cover should look, decide how many columns it should be in, DECIDE WHAT WORDS SHOULD BE IN IT and what words should be deleted, like, "in the manger", which they have deleted from the middle of page 1317, decide if it should be properly footnoted or not, decide when and what languages it should be translated into and who should do the translating, decide who is authorized to use the circles and the words Urantia and Urantian. To the best of my knowledge, The Foundation still asserts all these things, all the reasons we left them in the first place (someone correct me if this is wrong, OK?), but now the new leadership of the Fellowship has decided to toss all that out the window in order to make peace at any cost.
"Come to Helsinki." "Come to Paree", "Just forget the past, just make peace", the Foundation's beguiling Siren says, along with FEF subversives. Meanwhile the lies and the lawsuits and the altered text and the proprietary and imperious attitudes continue at the Foundation. But the PR is better.
Do you want to give the FEF your money so that they can give it to the Foundation? If they have less money maybe they will be less inclined to give $10,000 donations to the Foundation. Too bad they didn't give the ten grand to Kristen's cause. She's the one who could use it. Oh, I know, the FEF is largely supported by several big doners. The rest of us are small potatoes. But this is apparently the ONLY way you have to vote, to register your views, by voting with your wallet.
Here's an idea. If you support Kristen and her struggle, consider sending your past or potential future FEF pledge amount to Kristen instead. That's what I'm going to do until I see if the Fellowship is going to turn around again and go the way it was going, a way that was both reasonable and righteous. Admittedly, I was never a large FEF contributor so I hope Kristen doesn't get her hopes up, but quarterly at least she will see a smallish increased donation from me.
Please send your donations to:
Kristen Maaherra
152 California Gulch
Jamestown, CO 80455
This IS a worthy cause.
Anyway, it's something to think about, and don't forget about the "Perpetual" (means the same as "forever") Printing Fund that the FEF was soliciting money for just LAST year. "Perpetual" has about as much meaning for the Fellowship as "inviolate" has for the Foundation.
Norm.
The FELLOWSHIP for readers of The Urantia Book
October 29, 1997
Dear Urantia Book Reader,
Please don't throw this letter away or set it aside.
This letter is a sincere appeal for your monetary contribution to help The Fellowship achieve its mission of disseminating the teachings of The Urantia Book.
This letter is an appeal for your understanding of the needs of the readership community of which you are a part. True, "man does not live by bread alone." True also is the fact that man needs "bread" in order to survive on this God-blessed planet, Urantia.
Even our Master, gentle Jesus, our Creator Father, Michael of Nebadon, required his apostles to go into the community for funds to sustain his love-mission of bringing the message of the "Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Man" to the world.
The Fellowship community now has the same mission of bringing the Urantia Papers to the world. As believers we know that by fostering "service" to our fellows as a revealed understanding of God's love to us, we are contributing to the growth of the Supreme!
The Fellowship is dedicated to this mission of service -- of bringing the joy of the Urantia Papers to the world. As a reader you can help in this service mission and honestly, your help is sorely needed.
Over the years, the Brotherhood, now The Fellowship, has mainly depended on a generous few to foster our beloved revelation. Today, there are Whole Life Expos, Book Fairs, International Conferences, ongoing educational and research projects not to mention the daily requirements of "hearth and home". Our Internet activities alone are quickly becoming a major outreach tool to the world seeking to find the spiritual base that is beautifully manifest in the Urantia revelation.
It is essential that we all contribute to the best of our ability in order to provide the services that are required of The Fellowship.
The work and activities which The Fellowship funds are not bureaucratic jobs. In truth, most of the Fellowship's activities are accomplished by strictly volunteer help. Further, The Fellowship's few paid employees often work additional hours with no extra compensation. Consider the huge amount of effort necessary to run a Whole Life Expo at which thousands of potential readers are exposed to this epochal revelation. Or how about an International Conference? Perhaps you yourself came to know The Urantia Book through one of those efforts.
I am not begging. Not really. But I am asking you as part of our very broad God-knowing, God-loving community to help us, to help yourself, in providing the "service" we are asked to give to our fellows by making a contribution to our united and community efforts.
We need your help.
At this time of year we must acknowledge the hand of Uncle Sam in our monetary affairs. So whatever you can give in 1997 is, by law, tax deductible. Please be as generous as you can. If a dollar a day is too much for your budget, consider 50 cents. If you wish to designate your contribution to a particular activity or fund, feel free to do so. Stocks, bonds and properties are also most acceptable. But it's your call now. A self-addressed envelope is enclosed for your convenience. If questions, please feel free to call on me at (305) 294-5592 or FAX (305) 2940138 or KWA]oel@ AOL.com.
In loving service, Joe Liszka, (new) Chair Finance CommitteeJL/jh
Enc.
May I please make one further point. If you are going through the efforts of Estate Planning and/or Trusts, I urge you to contact me for further information. A Charitable Remainder Trust is a terrific instrument for both giver and receiver. See? Uncle Sam's not so bad after all. It's like having your cake and eating it too.