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The Whole Truth about the Sydney International Christian Church

At first glance, the Sydney International Christian Church’s (SICC) website looks like any other slick, well designed church website. Lots of things to click, lots of great stories, stories of baptisms, young people in every photo. Smiles.

However, below the header of the website, it also mentions that the church is “A Member of the SoldOut Discipling Movement”, a ‘movement’ that is currently led by Kip McKean.

Scroll a bit further down, and you’ll discover a photo-button that says, ‘Get the real truth at KIPMCKEAN.com’.

For those familiar with Kip McKean’s leadership, this should send a shiver down your spine.

In short – the Sydney International Christian Church isn’t a normal church group.

And Kip isn’t a normal church leader.

If you are a member of the Sydney International Christian Church, or you have a loved one within the group, then you should be very, very concerned.

For many years (through the 1980s and 1990s), Kip McKean led the International Churches of Christ (ICOC), a group that broke away from the mainline Churches of Christ denomination. The ICOC planted various churches throughout North America, Europe, Egypt, Hong Kong, Singapore and India. The ICOC started a church in Boston in the early 1970s, Boston then planted the Central London Church of Christ, and in 1983 a team from the Central London Church of Christ planted the Sydney Church of Christ.

The ICOC claimed to be a Bible based movement, in fact the only true movement of God in the world, and therefore the only church that had saved people in it – the only church with true disciples.

Anyone outside the ICOC would ultimately go to hell, including people in other mainline churches that were not ICOC churches. Kip taught that all other churches were lukewarm at best, and the ICOC was the only church that was truly on fire. The arrogance and pride of this is breathtaking.

The ICOC prided themselves on their discipleship – something that they thought no other church (besides their own) got right.

Yet their practices made the headlines, all over the world. Various reports stated that their discipleship was strict, abusive, controlling, and driven by money and pride.

Many people labelled the ICOC a cult, and many universities and colleges banned the group from their campuses. Moreover, there are scores and scores of websites and blogs written by people who have been profoundly damaged by the ICOC. There are thousands of people who got out of the ICOC and are still damaged emotionally, spiritually, and psychologically.

What’s interesting, is that I did a bit of research into the ICOC, and a name kept coming up: Henry Kriete.

In fact, almost everything written on the ICOC mentioned the ‘Henry Kriete Letter’, or just the ‘Kriete Letter’. As I dug deeper, I discovered that Henry Kriete was a senior leader in the Central London Church of Christ. It seems like the London Church of Christ was one of the flagship ICOC churches, and so Henry Kriete was high up in the food chain. He was an ‘evangelist’, which was a very well-respected position within the ICOC.

Yet Kriete saw many, many problems in the ICOC, and he couldn’t keep silent any longer.

And so Kriete chose to write a long (40 pages!) open letter to the ICOC in February 2003.

Importantly, Kriete was still a member of the ICOC at the time of writing his letter – he really was trying to reform it from within.

The letter is available for viewing here.

He also wrote a lesser-known letter a couple of years later.

His 2003 letter is certainly not an easy read, given the seriousness of the content. In many ways it’s just tragic.

For example, Henry Kriete, quoting someone else, writes:

The movement at this point has become a farce. The top leaders will meet in week to discuss governance, while Rome burns. The souls of 250,000 fall aways cry out against the very foundational structure of our churches, yet their aggregate value cannot even motivate an official apology, much less a meeting of the worlds leaders.

That is, prior to the publication of the letter, there were around 250,000 people who had left the ICOC. Many of those people were hurting, bitter, angry, and unable to have any sort of relationship with God anymore. The ICOC’s practices (i.e. Kip’s practices) had damaged so many people, perhaps irreparably.

The Kriete letter had the impact of bringing down the entire house of cards. And, it appears that it effectively brought down Kip McKean as well.

Ultimately, Kip ended up leaving the ICOC, although the timeline for his exit is a bit unclear to me. The ICOC still continues to this day, and they do appear to have reformed some of their own practices.

In fact 65 leaders within the ICOC published their own open letter in October 2005, addressed to Kip McKean. The letter is even handed, carefully worded, and harrowing. It is essentially a catalogue of Kip McKean’s sins in leadership, and quite frankly, it’s a long letter. The letter shows that Kip is full of pride, anger, and arrogance (to name a few of his sins) and really isn’t interested in changing, and therefore will continue to hurt people going forward.

Kip’s own website talks about this time, but it’s hagiography at its best (or worst). On his own website, Kip comes across as a deeply spiritual leader who has been screwed over by the system, and betrayed by those around him. His website basically says, sure, he might have made a few mistakes, but he is a prophet of our times, an infallible guru, a victim even, and someone dedicated to the work of ministry that everyone else has neglected. Kip’s website mentions none of the corrosive damage that his leadership caused, none of the fall out, none of the 250,000+ people who left his church with deep, deep scars.

Now – here’s the important part…

After leaving the ICOC, Kip McKean went on to found the International Christian Church (ICC) and the SoldOut Discipling Movement.

I’m reasonably familiar with the practices of the Sydney International Christian Church (the Sydney branch of the ICC), having known people that have been a part of the group.

I was blown away by the similarities between the damaging and manipulative practices outlined in Kriete’s letter, and the practices that I’ve been hearing about within the SICC.

In the SICC, young, single, vulnerable University Students are targeted by members who are ‘sharing’, or recruiting for the group. International students are often targetted for recruitment. Prospective members are drawn in by over-the-top, extreme love and care – known colloquially as ‘love bombing’. These sorts of tactics have already been publicly exposed, such as in this Guardian article from 2000.

Drawn in by such love and care, new members are quickly baptised, even if they have been baptised before at a different church. See, the Sydney International Christian Church still teach that they (being the International Christian Church) are the only true church, and that everyone else is going to hell. They believe this, because they believe that they are the only church anywhere in the world that perfectly and wholly follows the model of the early church in the book of Acts (in the New Testament).

This is a foundational teaching within the SICC and fills members with both fear and pride. Members fear that if they were to leave the group, then they would be destined for hell, as they would be leaving the very ‘kingdom of God’. And it gives members pride that they belong to the only true movement of God in the world. Kreite speaks about this same doctrine in his 2003 open letter.

It is a profoundly works-based theology, entirely bereft of the grace of God. It’s not a Christian teaching at all.

The group still practices a highly invasive form of confession, known as ‘sin lists’, where new converts share their personal sins in excruciating detail with other members of the group, all in the name of discipleship. The group draws out the information from the new convert, including whether or not the member was a victim of past abuse, all sexual activity, and other sensitive information. The new convert must ‘repent’ of all of this, including being a victim of past sexual abuse.

Members must give money to the group twice a week, as well as giving on special occasions. Special offertories are regularly collected for international conferences, special missions, trips overseas. University students are often giving thousands of dollars a year to the group. How is all of this money spent, and where does it all go?

Members are also encouraged to distance themselves from family and friends, especially if family and friends start to question the legitimacy of the SICC.

Older female members ‘disciple’ new female members, and confiscate any suggestive or revealing clothes that the younger member may have in their wardrobe.

Single members are coerced into going on ‘kingdom dates’, which is how the church sets up a couple within the church for marriage (which is another form of control). Members are only allowed to marry within the ICC. It is more or less an arranged marriage. Many young women in the group have reported that they were set up with men that they had no interest in, but were still coerced into going on a date.

Single members are also coerced into moving into ICC-run share houses, which are often cramped and over-crowded.

The group meets daily, sometimes for ‘bible study’, sometimes for church services, sometimes for outreach, sometimes to raise money.

The process of discipleship is usually very intense, controlling, and manipulative. ‘Advice’ is given to younger disciples by their leader, but ‘advice’ is expected to be followed, and challenging or questioning the leadership is strongly discouraged. In other words, the power of someone’s own decision making and autonomy is taken away from them – all in the name of discipleship.

The SICC rapidly engulfs your life.

Of course, it is extremely difficult to leave a group like this. After all, members are left socially isolated, financially poor, emotionally vulnerable, no longer able to make their own adult decisions, and extremely fearful of going to hell.

Compounding this is the fact that members of the group know so much personal information about them. I have heard that sometimes this personal information (that has been shared in the ‘sin lists’) is maliciously used against people later on.

Moreover, people that leave the group are ‘marked’ and ‘disfellowshipped’, i.e. excommunicated. That is, they are publicly humiliated as backsliders, it’s said that they must be embittered, overcome by Satan, and are destined for hell.

In short – the practices of the International Christian Church have Kip McKean’s fingerprints all over them. Since Kreite’s letter in 2003, not much has changed by the look of it. The ‘movement’ has been re-branded to the innocuous sounding ‘International Christian Church’, and the ‘SoldOut Movement’, but the damaging, corrosive, abusive legacy continues.

What’s amazing is that the Sydney International Christian Church operates brazenly on university campuses in Sydney, including Sydney University and the University of NSW (UNSW).

To read more about the International Christian Church, have a look at this Reddit page.

Were you a member of the group? Feel free to share your experiences.

Do you have a loved one in the group? Feel free to comment.