A group of Honor Academy alumni have written an “Open Letter to Those Considering the Honor Academy.” I am not an author of this document nor was I involved in putting up this website, but I do support it. At the time of this writing, the document has over 70 signatures from alumni and staff all across the years. Some have contributed their stories to this blog, most have not. Here is the text of the letter:
This open letter is to those considering participation in Teen Mania’s “Honor Academy,” or those considering sending a young adult to the Honor Academy.
We, the undersigned, ask you respectfully to reconsider.
We’re not telling you not to do it. We’re simply asking you to prayerfully consider all facts before making your final decision.
Who are we, you ask? We are former interns. We are alumni of Teen Mania’s Honor Academy. We are former Mission Advisors, Team Leaders, and Project Directors with Teen Mania Global Expeditions. We are former Teen Mania staff and volunteers. We are professionals. We are parents.
We are concerned.
In your search for information about Teen Mania and the Honor Academy, you may have read incendiary comments online calling Teen Mania things like “cult”, or calling the Honor Academy “abuse”. These comments have been made at websites like RecoveringAlumni.com, and have been made by intelligent, feeling people with reasonable cause to say such things.
We will not say those things here, but we fully support the community behind RecoveringAlumni.com, and similar groups of people who have been hurt or otherwise marginalized by Teen Mania. We support their right to be heard, and we believe that their voices are very important – especially to you, as you are making a decision that could alter your life forever.
Also, we want something to be very clear: We are filled with love for our brothers and sisters at Teen Mania. We believe that their intentions are true, and though we find their practices misguided and often dangerous, we do not believe that their motives are to hurt others. The staff, volunteers, interns, and donors involved with Teen Mania and its various divisions believe that they are doing God’s work, in God’s way. Though we disagree with them, we do not doubt their sincerity.
Our concerns (which, we should clarify, are in fact opinions) can be summarized with the following statements:
Teen Mania, specifically the Honor Academy, promotes a culture of elitism that has no place in the Body of Christ.
Teen Mania’s training practices, such as the Life Transforming Event formerly known as “ESOAL”, are potentially dangerous and may result in long-term emotional and physical harm to participants.
Teen Mania is accountable mainly to individuals and organizations who benefit from their existence or would otherwise be inconvenienced if they failed. We feel that this is dangerous.
Teen Mania has a longstanding, albeit anecdotal, reputation for “burning people out”, and putting Teen Mania’s cause above the emotional and sometimes physical health and safety of those who participate in fulfilling their mission. We should know. We are among those participants.
Teen Mania’s response to the community behind RecoveringAlumni.com, particularly with the now-defunct website, RecoveringAlumniResponse.com, has been un-Christlike, unprofessional, and has lacked compassion or contrition for the people who have been so deeply hurt by the organization.
So this letter serves as a voice of very serious concern, bordering on a “vote of no confidence”, about the leadership of Teen Mania, its various practices, and specifically the Honor Academy program, which we fear is particularly dangerous physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
Please know that it is difficult — even painful — for us to even post this letter, as the people we are referring to are friends, former coworkers, and family. Ron Luce and Teen Mania have had a profound effect on each of us, and in some ways we owe a debt to this organization.
But because we love it so much, we can no longer remain silent. We must make our voices heard so that you can make a truly informed decision, having heard from parties who are concerned that Teen Mania is no longer the ministry we fell in love with, but has become something that we can no longer support.
For many of the stories, evidence, and discussions about the Honor Academy that have caused us concern, please visit RecoveringAlumni.com with an open mind and heart.
If you would like to add your signature to this letter, please visit the website here and follow the guidelines below.
We ask that only individuals involved with Teen Mania in the following capacities sign: Internship/HA Alumnus, Missionary Advisor, Project Director, Team Leader, Staff.
Your “signature” should be only your name, a simple “I agree.” or similar, and your involvement with Teen Mania.
8 comments:
shannon-ashley aka shannikittysays:November 16, 2011 at 10:08 AMReply
I think this letter was beautifully and commendably written. Whoever put the Concerned Alumni site–I am grateful to them.
I would really like to know TM’s response to this. I found many familiar staff and GI names among the signatures whom were extremely well-respected within the ministry. This is not a “black sheep” issue where only certain types of alumni, etc. are speaking out about TM, or at the very least expressing concern.
I actually brought up this open letter to Heath Stoner in an email conversation last night and his respnse was all defensiveness (why didn’t they post the Dave Hasz apology letter) and later accusatory (they want to make it look like TM doesn’t care). He didn’t even respond to the content of the letter, nor did he explain why TM themselves took down Dave’s letter.
Wendy J Duncansays:November 16, 2011 at 10:12 PMReply
It takes a lot of courage for individuals to sign their name to this letter. Remember that there is power in numbers
Anonymoussays:November 17, 2011 at 9:08 AMReply
Shannon, if you look at the list of names we have been removing them from friend of TM status systematically.
Ericsays:November 17, 2011 at 9:18 AMReply
Because nobody is ever allowed to be friends with anyone who disagrees with them, if they’re in a cult.
shannon-ashley aka shannikittysays:November 17, 2011 at 10:17 AMReply
‘Friend of TM status’?
Who needs that anyway? What are those consequences?
Mifunesays:November 17, 2011 at 6:47 PMReply
Anon: Yeah, that list doesn’t exist. TM has a hard enough time keeping basic things running sometimes…as overworked as it can be there, no one is spending effort putting together lists of alumni in good and bad standing with TM. They have actual work to do.
Doug_Duncansays:November 17, 2011 at 10:33 PMReply
From the ICSA website:
• Cults vary tremendously.
• Different people respond differently to the same group.
• Controversial cults tend to be characterized by control-oriented leadership that places high demands on members, expects compliance, discourages questioning, isolates members from those who might threaten the leader’s control, and offers the carrot of a pseudo-elitism to compensate for the members’ submission to leadership
Dansays:December 9, 2011 at 8:53 AMReply
LOL…is there an actual thing called “friend of TM status”? And I can be systematically removed from it?
That’s…that’s awesome. I mean, like, really, really awesome. Somewhere, there is a list of people with “Friend of TM” status. I don’t even know what to say about that. So awesome.