Creation Ministries International UK
CMI UK is the UK and European arm of Creation Ministries International (CMI).
CMI is an Australian creationist organisation based in Brisbane, Queensland. It has quite a complex history but, in essence, was founded in the 1980s; it has a long history of its backers falling out with each other. John Mackay, one of the founders, left in 1987 – apparently after a failed grab for control of the organisation.
The organisation later became part of Answers in Genesis and was known as such until early 2006.
The rather complicated history is detailed here and here.
Mackay’s partner, Ken Ham, who later went on to establish Answers in Genesis in the USA, appears to have, likewise, deeply fallen out with the Australians behind Creation Ministries. Indeed, in what again looks to be internal power struggles that threatened Ham’s position as head of Answers in Genesis, Creation Ministries was split off from Answers in Genesis in early 2006.
What looks to have happened is that in the power struggle between Ken Ham and the Australians at what was then AiG Australia, Ham completely out manoeuvred them.
Creation Ministries International now basically consists of the main Australian founding arm of Answers in Genesis plus the former sister AiG operations in Canada, South Africa and New Zealand. However, CMI looks to be establishing new operations in the USA and the UK. We understand that this is partly the result of a “trade war” with Answers in Genesis in the USA over subscriptions to the organisations’ creationist journal.
(As at December 2006, CMI was stating that its “very new” office in the USA “is in the process of building up and training a speaker team, commencing with a small nucleus.”)
However, in the case of the UK it also looks to reflect divisions within Answers in Genesis UK over the treatment of the Australian staff of Creation Ministries International.
CMI’s web site suggests that Answers In Genesis UK’s deputy CEO, Philip Bell, resigned from AiG in 2006 because of this. Bell, it adds, was then pushed out of the organisation altogether by its head, Monty White, before he could work out his notice and speaking engagements.
There is no doubt that the dispute between the two organisations is bitter – CMI has detailed its side of the affair in depth on its web site (see http://www.creationontheweb.com/content/view/4769/ and http://www.creationontheweb.com/images/pdfs/dispute/Chronological_orderSHORT.pdf and http://www.creationontheweb.com/images/pdfs/dispute/response.pdf and http://www.creationontheweb.com/content/view/4261/ and http://www.creationontheweb.com/images/pdfs/other/salem_revisited.pdf and http://www.creationontheweb.com/images/pdfs/other/information_package.pdf
The best we can conclude from all this is that the three creationist organisations involved – CMI, Answers in Genesis and Creation Research (John Mackay) are completely nuts. The staggering element in it is the charges of necrophilia and witchcraft which we have detailed in the section of our web site on Margaret Buchanan. She is the wife of Carl Wieland, overall head of CMI in Australia.
Both Ken Ham and John Mackay come over as particularly sleazy characters. The whole thing sounds like a really unfunny surrealist farce.
Anti-creationist Jim Lippard has summarised CMI’s side on his blog at http://lippard.blogspot.com/2006/11/more-from-behind-scenes-of.html and http://lippard.blogspot.com/2006/11/john-mackay-and-answers-in-genesis.html
Here are some comments we received on the split: “Creation Ministries International has recently updated their web page about the AiG split and include a very detailed (despite the title: “brief chronology of events”) that is a truly revealing look behind the scenes and should shed some light on recent speculation about the underlying reasons behind the split. Interestingly, it appears the root cause of the division which began almost 2 years ago now is was the suggestion that AiG-USA should disperse power among more individuals rather than placing all decision making into the hands of Ken Ham. The end result of the split is that Ham clearly has gained an even greater hold on power and is virtually autonomous in all decisions at this point. I fear that AiG, which is the most influential creationist’s organisations will only become more extreme in its beliefs and tactics going forward. It will be interesting to see if some of big names that have supported his “ministry” will remain as loyal or if this will cause some re-evaluation of support in the future. It is clear that AiG/Ham are doing everything they can to keep the events of the past year out of the limelight and are acting as if nothing has happened. They are now shipping their new magazine to all subscribers of Creation Mag calling it a upgrade when really it a replacement for a journal that is still being produced and for which subscribers rightly should be continuing to receive.”
In late 2006 CMI announced that Philip Bell had been appointed CEO of Creation Ministries International UK/Europe, effective from 1st January 2007. It appears that between being kicked out of AiG by Monty White and formally joining CMI he took “he took on the unpaid responsibility of being one of the founding trustees/directors of Creation Ministries International Ltd (UK/Europe)”.
According to CMI’s web site in late December 2006 CMI’s head, Carl Wieland, sits on the board of an unspecified creationist organisation in the UK. (We would dearly love to confirm which organisation this is.)
However, CMI also had a presence in the UK in the Autumn of 2006 in the form of a virtual office at 5 Percy St, Office 4, London W1T 1DG. According to http://london.zpages.co.uk/answering-and-message-services “Our friendly and professional receptionist team provide a telephone answering service in your company name, plus mail forwarding from our London business address. Address: 5 Percy St, 1st, 2nd & 3rd Floors, London, W1T 1DG.”
The full list of people involved in Creation Ministries International is as follows:
Australia
Carl Wieland, CEO
Don Batton, senior “scientist”
Jonathan Sarfati, senior “scientist”
Gary Bates, head of ministry
Tas Walker, senior staff “geologist”
David Catchpool, senior “scientist”
Pierre Jerlström, staff “scientist”
Peter Sparrow, creation bus ministry
Russell Grigg, writer, editor
Mark Robertson, part time
Mark Harwood, part time
John Hartnett, part time
Rod Walsh, part time
Barry Tapp, part time
UK
Philip Bell, CEO
The trustees of CMI in the UK are Timothy John Mathews, Rachel Christina Revell and Donald James Batten.
Canada
Richard Fangrad, CEO
Emil Silvestru, senior staff “scientist”
Calvin Smith, part time
New Zealand
Adrian Bates, CEO
South Africa
Johan Kruger, CEO
