Bg357

Response to BG and Truth

(Re: RLM dispute)

from comments here.

As far as contradictory sources: Both Outreach Magazine and Spokesman Review *appear* to be reliable sources. I say appear because I'm not familiar with either but I haven't seen any reports that they're not neutral/fact checkers. However if Outreach uses RLM's own data, and I have e-mailed them to find out if it's the case - no answer yet but I'll share it when I do, then using it for this is not valid per WP:RS because it's not independent. What I'd really like to see, but from what I gather they're not available online is the actual docs filed in court that were first discussed here. Can you prove it didn't grow? I don't know, I don't know that auditorium size is enough to base that on. The Miracle Growth/CDA Press article that 1Truth cited in this version seems to show that they're indeed shrinking. But not having seen it, I don't know and I don't know enough about CDA to judge it as a reliable source or not per WP:RS.

My question to both (or three, if Mountain is watching this) is what does the growth matter? Is that the only basis for notability for the church? It's big, that much is undisputed, I think. Does the actual number matter? Is there anything else to say about this church other than plans for growth. Go back to whoever decided to write this article (I can't tell from how many times it's been deleted who it was). Why did you think there needed to be an article on this church? Why should it matter to anyone who isn't a local resident and/or member of the congregation. What's important about it? I'm going to assume the best and hope that there isn't a conflict of interest from any staff member here because all things aside, WP isn't a very good PR tool.

I honestly think having something else to say about the church so that the vast majority of the article isn't about the size, growth or not, and noew properties. THoughts? TRAVELLINGCARI^{My story}_{Tell me yours} 00:58, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Thoughts

1) You seem to be continuing to advocate for a deletion of the article based on a lack of notability. Even though you've already tagged it, it's been discussed, and the result was a keep. What difference would it make if the 3 or 4 of us agreed that there's nothing notable here? I personally couldn't care less at this point whether the article lives or dies, but if the article remains, I will not stand by while these two detractors turn it into a hit-piece. Given the recent posts here by Mountainview, I think it's fair to say he's clearly a detractor. 1TruthTracker, is not as clearly a detractor, but given the agenda of her/his edits and the fact that Mountainview has vouched for them... it's pretty safe to say.

2)You've posted earlier that you were concerned that "there are sources that appear to contradict one another". You haven't elaborated on that contention, to the point of sharing the sources that concerned you. It's my contention that all the available, reliable sources are fairly consistent. The article is based on the reliable sources that are available, and they paint a pretty consistent picture.

3) Your concern with the verifiability of Outreach Magazine is fair enough I suppose, but I really think it leads to a conundrum at the very nub of verifiability & reliable sources. Let me explain. You don't have any personal experience with the sources involved in this article and that's understandable, but I doubt if you would be concerned with a citation from the NYTimes, in regards to WP:RS. But how would the NYTimes approach such an article? They would send a reporter out to see the church, talk to staff members, ask the church for their attendance statistics, so on & so forth. I guess the point is, where would information regarding a church's attendance come from other than the church itself. I don't think the police are offering crowd estimates, I'm not aware of any officially authorized "church census administration" that stands outside the doors counting heads as they pass. Census data is a good example, I'm sure official census data doesn't run afoul of WP:RS, but how is it tabulated? Surveys are sent out and filled out with data provided by those who are being counted. Obviously, there's more going on with an official census to make sure that the numbers aren't completely off the wall, but the method is the same.

4) I'm not sure if I understand your interest in documents regarding property deeds and conditional use agreements. Those are the only documents that were discussed at the link you provided. I have always been led to believe that such minutia has no place in an encyclopedic article.

5) With all due respect, I can't believe you've brought up the auditorium discussion. I can't see how it can possibly show "shrinkage". The current auditorium seats 1700(or 1800, depending on the source), the proposed new auditorium would seat 3500 and would be expandable from there, according to news reports that have been cited. 1Truth's contention about a 3600 seat auditorium is based on a master plan reported five years ago. The original plan called for a doubling of the current building, resulting in a doubling of the auditorium size. This expansion has not occurred so the current auditorium size is the only relevant fact. There hasn't been much reporting to cite on the reasons why the current site has not been expanded, but from what I understand, parking issues & lack of arterial access for the resulting mass of traffic has precluded additional expansion at the current site. It would seem that these issues have led the church to seek new property for further expansion. None of this has been added to the article because, as I said, there's nothing to cite in reference to it.

6) As for "something else to say about the church", there are many things that could be added but few that would have verifiable sourcing citations, and would therefore result in further edit wars as detractors ripped it to shreds. As you have intimated, if the churches size & growth rate are not notable or verifiable(a contention that I personally disagree with), and nothing else can be added that wouldn't be ripped to shreds by detractors, what do we really have here? An empty shell of an article with some mention of a Boise Bible College extension campus, although at one time that section was also attacked by vandals and resulted in more vandalism on the Boise Bible College page.[1] Given the standard you seem to be putting forth, not many church articles would remain on Wikipedia, regardless of their size, growth or influence.

Finally, I appreciate your efforts in mediating this dispute, although I'm not sure what has been gained. We still have two detractors chomping at the bit to push their agenda as soon as the full protection is removed. Is there a guideline such as WP:Hopeless Situation that we could review?? Bg357 (talk) 19:56, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

I misspoke on part of this writing late last night, what I meant about notability was that size (and whether it's 5 church members, 500, 5000 or 500,000,000,000 doesn't matter so let's put that debate aside for a moment) isn't necessarily something to be excited about. I highly doubt that anyone is going to find/read this article and find that their world has been changed by knowing about its growth and future construction plans. I'm not saying it should be deleted, that discussion has been settled. I'm saying there has to be more. Does that make sense? I see 314 news hits (includes the two in recent) and while some are not remotely encyclopedic, i.e. a church breakfast, there has to be something to say about the church. Right now if I stumble across this article, it leaves me wondering 'what's significant about this church?' because the article doesn't tell me what's different about it from any of the churches in the US.

And as for the data coming right from the church, I'd hope that the NY Times or whatever other source would do some due diligence to find out if the information is true. I could tell a reporter that I'm the first female player signed to the Yankees (you can tell wehre my brain is today) and I'd hope they'd do some digging to verify it rather than take what I say as fact. Does that make sense? TRAVELLINGCARI^{My story}_{Tell me yours} 20:35, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

'To TRAVELLINGCARI: There isn't much more about this church. The majority of their offerings are consumed by the leadership staff as evidenced by the two glimpses that mave been made public. They are using WP as a marketing tool. What you and my community are witnessing is the advanced state of the city church of the 90s being propelled into the Emergent Church of the Great Tribulation. This is not a good thing. The Emergent church is to be recognized as an enemy of all that is Holy. It is a counterfeit of Christ's Body - the Bride. Those who find themselves enwrapped in it's teachings may enjoy reading the series Left Behind. They will be!' —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mountainview (talk • contribs) 01:59, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

I'd like to thank you TRAVILLINGCARI for really looking at my responses and comments and responding in an independent way with reason and an open-mind. I really appreciate it. The only thing I can do with the county recorded documents is take pictures of them and email them, take copies and send them to an address, or fax them. I will have to think about your question about having something else to say about the church and let you know shortly. Again, thank you.--1TruthTracker (talk) 04:59, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

I may have jumped uninvited into the middle of your conversation 1TruthTracker & TRAVILLINGCARI. If I did, please accept my apologies. In my years of learning to research subjects, the FIVE - W'S were typically the foundation questions: Who, What, When, Where, and Why plus How. I previously linked a Spokesman-Review article titled: How to grow a congregation: 'It's a God thing' [2] that answered most of those questions. I do not understand why my comment was eliminated as it related to Lydia Grubb's claim that they read Rick Warren's book The Purpose Driven Church which is all about planting and growing a new church.

The launch of the Real Life Ministry WikiPage by BG357 contained no verifiable third party sources. BG357 states that he did not remove my citation. I haven't succeeded in discovering who exceuted an 'undo' or revision that deletd my reference as well as link to my blog site with a multitude of credible newspaper links to the disparaging, unpatriotic, ecumenical activities of Rick Warren. As RWs' book is part of the foundation for RLM, it can be justly understood to heavily influence their policies and practices.--Mountainview (talk) 18:27, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

I have never stated that I didn't remove your citation. I explained exactly what I had done in the edit summary, when I removed your comments.[3] The reference to that Spokesman-Review article already existed in the reference list so I removed your improperly placed inline citation, I also removed your comments due to irrelevancy. One member of the staff mentioning that they read a particular book, doesn't mean that the church was founded solely on the principles found in that book, as you seem to assume. If there had been a quote in the article from a pastor or elder that said "we founded this church based on the principles found in such & such a book", then you would have had a point in posting something about it in the article. As it stands, that particular comment was inconsequential & irrelevant, which is why it was removed. The article remained in the reference list for anyone to read and draw their own conclusions. Bg357 (talk) 20:17, 30 March 2008 (UTC)