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City Harvest is a group of churches as well as a Christian religious denomination based in Asia and focused on Christian missions. Although City Harvest claims to be a Christian denomination of its own, its doctrines show uncanny resembalance to that of the Charismatic movement. The tenets preached by City Harvest include the existence of modern day miracles suchs as tongue speaking, healing and prophesying which often manifest during the church's worship services.
The group had a humble beginning with twenty people in Singapore's City Harvest Church and in fifteen years it has grown to more than 17,000 members, making it one of the fastest growing churches in Singapore. The group claims to convert an average of four hundred people a week. Fourteen branch churches in Malaysia, India, Indonesia and the Philippines affliate directly with the Singapore church, which now boasts a Titanium-clad building, and other churches have been instituted emulating the City Harvest concept and its doctrine.
The group maintains a school, the City Harvest Bible Training Center, which trains pastors from various countries and offers diplomas and advanced certificates jointly with Oral Roberts University. It also holds a biannual international pastors' school that encourages sharing of success stories and holds workshops to train church leaders; the most recent session attracted 5,000 attendees from twenty nations.
The group also maintains a welfare organization founded by Rev. Kong Hee and Ho Yeow Sun, the City Harvest Community Services Association, which in a year provides 5,000 Singapore residents of various races and religions with counselling and financial aid.
The Other Side
City Harvest Church (CHC) also enjoys a controversial reputation in its country of origin. It is an independent church and it's not considered a denomination by most. It is notorious amongst non-christians as well as within the orthodox Christian community.
Some notable issues include that of Ms Ho Yeow Sun who started a career as a singer after having served many years in church. Ho sported the moniker as the Pastor-Singer and was indeed known as Pastor Ho in church. However, midway through her career, possibly to accomodate activities such as wearing slinky dresses deemed inappropriate for a pastor, she denied that she was an ordained pastor. She claims that the term pastor is given to someone who helps to lead the congregation and need not necessarily refer to someone who is theologically trained to preach and exhort. The claim is in contradiction with the traditional interpretations of the word pastor as it refers to a male whose role is to teach, preach and to lead the memebers of a church.
Non-believers and believers alike are often upset by CHC's high pressure sales tactic employed in evangelizing non-believers and poaching members from other churches. There is also fervent focus on finances such as a 'voluntary' membership fee upon age of majority of a young member. While dubbed as voluntary and not compulsory, it is understood that immense peer & theological pressure is brought to bear on any member unwilling to pay the amount, last rumoured at $500. Members are also encouraged to set aside a monthly tithe for the church.
These amongst other issues such as a multi-million club house church building has ignited the enterpreneur spirit of many young Singaporeans now aspiring to start their own churches. The strength of this attribute is evident in the previous anonymous edit bestowing the title of "Cash Harvesting Church" to CHC.
In some extreme cases, CHC has been labeled as a cult by members from both non-christians and christian community. It is also notable as the only one of the largest and successful churches in Singapore to garner a strong reputation even amongst non-believers.
Arguably, it can be said that CHC is merely executing to perfection a marketing strategy aimed to provide maximum exposure as a tool in aid of religious evangelism, at the expense of the orthodox Christians.
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