You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.

2.0
informative reflective medium-paced

 This is the personal account of Tanya Levin, a member of a fundamentalist Christian religion, Assemblies of God, that grew into what we know as Hillsong. I have to say that I dislike organized religion in general, but I especially dislike the mega-church aspect. This is a multi-million dollar organization that operates under the tax-free leeway given to churches. This takes advantage of members, and I hate seeing people be fleeced for religion. In this book, she does touch on the sexual issues of the church leaders. Yes, he was unfaithful, lots of people are. When people in positions of power engage is sexual misbehavior and then use the church and nonsense to try to make themselves the victim, it is disgusting. It is manipulative and abusive. The author does take a look at American ministries, where Hillsong also operates now, which I also found slightly unfair. She sort of makes the assumption that all churches operate like Westboro Baptist Church (which I find to be the most disgusting next to the FLDS). Mega Churches and fundamentalist churches in the United States are gross and criminal. Churches operate under that tax-free thing, but they want to involve themselves in politics. I can't stand that, and it should not be allowed at all. I did like the points she made about Southern Baptists, because I live in the South and Southern Baptists are rampant and a lot of them are miscreants that engage in all types of abuses.

I hate to say that I am extremely disappointed in this book. I always like books about personal experiences, so I hate to say that I did not like this book as well as I anticipated. I do not want to negate someone's personal experience. The writing in this book was rambling at points, and hard to follow. Scenes change randomly, without any rhyme or reason. I would not recommend this book. There has to be other books out there that are better reads. I would encourage you to watch the Hillsong documentary (I think it is on Discovery Plus) for a more thorough look at this ministry. That is what motivated me to buy this book. I generally enjoy learning about cults, and while this made some good points, it was not at all what it was touted to be. It really let me down.