Introduction
This report is a compilation of experiences with Hope Christian Church from the past 11 years,
from those who have either edited this document (listed at the end), or whom we have quoted in the body
of this document. Overall, 14 people contributed to the creation of this report, and over 30 others are cited.
We have elected to protect the anonymity of some of the editors who requested it, because they are
fearful of Hope Christian Church finding out that they helped file this report. We have heard tell of fairly
ruthless defaming and even some instances of threats (though details were not given) toward those who
have spoken badly of their experience with Hope in the past. None of this should be taken as a personal
attack upon Hope leadership; they very well could believe they are having positive impact at ASU. But as
this report will demonstrate, this is simply not the case. Based on these compiled experiences contained
in the following 123 pages, we believe that Hope Christian Church engages in practices which:

I.
II.

III.

IV.

V.

Create an unhealthy environment for student life, and in some cases violate the student
code of conduct
Create relational dynamics and a community environment which can (and do) render
emotional and psychological damage to it’s members, former members, and even
non-members
Can be traced back to Hope Christian Church’s parent organizations on the first, second,
and third levels, all of whom have been widely criticized by evangelical leaders and
scholars as religious cults
Involve the utilization of “brainwashing” techniques (intentionally or
unintentionally) which have have been identified in sociology and social
psychology research, as well as by evangelical leaders as characteristic of
religious cults
Provide distorted interpretation of Biblical doctrine and scriptures in order to
advance the interests of the Church

All told, we have identified 4 categories of code of conduct violation, 6 categories of other practices
unhealthy for student life, 8 categories of emotional/psychological abuse, and 44 indicators of religious
cult-activity, which Hope Christian Church has demonstrated a clear and unchanging pattern of, based on
the experiences catalogued in this report. Most experiences shared are individual, but some are prefaced
(or concluded) with a phrase such as “All the editors of this document affirm…”. Such phrasing indicates
that all the editors of the document (excluding parents and family) can recall multiple past experiences
which would fit the criteria the given category, and that therefore, in the interest of time and limiting the size
of this report, we have elected to provide a “summary-form” relation of the experiences. Summaries of each
category of offense are also given before the related experiences, in order to tie together the threads from
all the various stories. We believe that these 62 patterns of behavior on the part of Hope Christian Church
can be, and often are ultimately quite harmful to the ASU students who either engage in them, are
impacted by them, or both.