Community Chapel and Bible Training Center was a controversial independent church created in 1967 and pastored by Donald Lee Barnett in which he taught his version of Oneness Pentecostalism. The church eventually grew to an attendance of over 3,000 before splitting and losing significant numbers in 1988 because of numerous lawsuits brought against Barnett and others in the church leadership for sexual improprieties. Community Chapel became famous for a practice its leaders advocated known as "spiritual connections." This practice involved seeking intense emotional experiences of love with another person, usually not one's spouse, while dancing together in worship. It was taught at the Chapel that through this experience, Jesus, specially known to the participants as "the glorified Son of Man" because of the teaching of Barnett, was connecting the members of his church together in love as he had always meant them to be.
Famous quotes containing the words community, chapel, training and/or center:
“Commitment, by its nature, frees us from ourselves and, while it stands us in opposition to some, it joins us with others similarly committed. Commitment moves us from the mirror trap of the self absorbed with the self to the freedom of a community of shared values.”
—Michael Lewis (late 20th century)
“I went to the Garden of Love,
And saw what I never had seen:
A Chapel was built in the midst,
Where I used to play on the green.
And the gates of this Chapel were shut,
And ‘Thou shalt not’ writ over the door;”
—William Blake (1757–1827)
“When the child is twelve, your wife buys her a splendidly silly article of clothing called a training bra. To train what? I never had a training jock. And believe me, when I played football, I could have used a training jock more than any twelve-year-old needs a training bra.”
—Bill Cosby (20th century)
“Thine age asks ease, and since thy duties be
To warm the world, that’s done in warming us.
Shine here to us, and thou art everywhere;
This bed thy center is, these walls, thy sphere.”
—John Donne (1572–1631)