Hi,

As a journalist investigating a variety of scammers, hucksters, confidence artists and conmen, you often have some pretty frustrating conversations.

Then there’s Arise church.

As I’ve banged on about a lot here on Webworm, Arise has never really been particularly great to communicate with — avoiding and ignoring questions.

But then sometimes you’ll have an exchange that feels like you’re talking to the shittiest AI on the planet. The conversation is meaningless, it goes nowhere, and ultimately it makes you want to drive your head through the drywall of your apartment just to make it all fucking stop.

Here’s a recent exchange I had when reporting on Charlotte’s legal bills.

I am not sending this out as a mail-out as your inbox doesn’t deserve this idiocy. But I wanted to post it on the Webworm site for posterity*

Fuck.

David.

*Before a reader corrected me I’d spelt this “prosperity”. Too much time writing about fucking money-obsessed megachurches.

A small dog nestled into my socks looking sad — My friend’s sad dog, probably wanting to throw itself off the fucking balcony after reading the email exchange that follows.

The E-Mail Exchange That Made Me Want to Bludgeon My Head Against The Wall

Sun, Jan 15, 10:20 PM (3 days ago)

To: Arise
CC: Hayden Donnell (my co-reporter on Arise idiocy)
From: David Farrier
Hi Arise Board,
Do you have any comment to make in regards to legal costs incurred by Charlotte Cummings during her efforts to release the Pathfinding report?
Many thanks
David Farrier.

Mon, Jan 16, 9:11 PM (2 days ago)

To: David Farrier
From: Arise

Kia ora Dave,
Apologies we didn’t meet you deadline, but are aware you have run a story regardless.
We would like to point out an inaccuracy in the recent story and request that you make some clarifications and corrections:
Arise has not at any time tried to stop the publishing of the report. You have stated that at least twice in the article. Can that be corrected please.
Can you confirm that you will make these corrections please.
to your original question, you can find our statement here: https://arisechurch.com/news/update-from-arise-board-regarding-pathfinding
Thank you

Tue, Jan 17, 11:18 AM (1 day ago)

To: Arise
From: David Farrier

Hey -
Who am I talking to here?
And no, I can’t correct that statement, because that statement doesn't exist in my recent pieces.
David.

Jan 17, 2023, 12:54 PM (23 hours ago)

To: David Farrier
From: Ben Kendrew (Arise’s lead pastor), apparently

Hi David,
This is Ben replying in this instance.
Apologies, you didn’t include exact phrase, sorry for that.
We have had to correct this information at another outlet and in some posts online, so we also sent to you as your story included: various individuals and parties at the church fought to bury the report
and we want to clarify that it was not the church attempting to bury the report. At the time we argued for the release of the report & the non-publication order prevented us from doing so.
Again, sorry, i acknowledge you didn’t explicitly state that.
Thank you,

Tue, Jan 17, 6:47 PM (17 hours ago)

From: Hayden Donnell
To: Arise/Ben Kendrew

What is inaccurate about that phrasing?

Jan 17, 2023, 8:06 PM (16 hours ago)

Hi Hayden,
Sorry, what phrasing are you referring to?
Just want to make sure I understand your question correctly.
Thanks

Tue, Jan 17, 8:07 PM (16 hours ago)

From: David Farrier
To: Arise/Ben Kendrew

The phrase you just quoted:
“various individuals and parties at the church fought to bury the report”

Tue, Jan 17, 8:34 PM (16 hours ago)

From: Arise/Ben Kendrew
To: David Farrier

Thanks for clarifying.
I quoted that as it intimates that the church or people representing the church attempted to bury the report. I apologise for making that assumption.
As clarified in our statement yesterday, the church board and leadership did not seek to block it at all.

12:26 PM (16 minutes ago)

From: David Farrier
To: Arise/Ben Kendrew

Hey Ben,
To reiterate, Webworm’s reporting has been accurate.
David.

To summarise, Arise failed to answer my original question, and then turned around and accused me of being inaccurate in my reporting.

Which I wasn’t.

They also sneakily changed some of the wording in their original press release when they uploaded onto their website — without making it clear they’d suddenly changed things. Things like this:

Original release:

We have reached out to Charlotte to discuss her situation and whether there is anything we can do to assist.

Updated version, after it was pointed out that they’d never fucking reached out:

However we are reaching out to Charlotte to discuss her situation and whether there is anything we can do to assist.

Original release:

Arise Church has paid Pathfinding’s invoice in full

Updated version:

Arise Church has paid Pathfinding’s agreed costs in full,

Emphasis mine.

Same shit, different day.

And to think these people are meant to be in charge of key aspects of your life, as well as getting your soul into the afterlife.

David.

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