inline Churches of Christ, and were often dismissed by those outside of theChurches of Christ as sectarian squabbles. But the new complaints came from all quarters-- Christian churches, Jewish leaders, and secular psychologists who had seen a string ofpatients who showed evidence of severe psychological abuse and who had all beenmembers of the ICC.Theology of the ICCWith a few notable exceptions, the doctrines of the ICC are the same as those of the"mainline" Churches of Christ from which the ICC came. In this page, I will try to coverboth those doctrines which the ICC shares with its parent church, and those in which itdiffers from the mainline Churches of Christ.First, we need to discuss the sources of ICC theology -- who has the authority to speakand teach for the ICC. As the ICC understands this, the Bible is the ultimate source ofauthority. In practice, though, Kip McKean, the World Missions Evangelist and head ofthe ICC, is the ultimate authority and source for ICC doctrine, as well as the actualpractices of the group. This does not mean he writes all doctrinal material used by thegroup -- others in the ICC, notably Gordon Ferguson, Doug Jacoby, and Mike Taliferro,have each written and published considerably more than McKean. What McKean haswritten, though, is authoritative, and nothing the others write is published by the ICC orused in it without his approval.Among the work actually written by McKean or attributed to him are the First PrinciplesBible study series, which almost all recruits in the past twenty years were taken throughprior to their baptisms, and Revolution through Restoration, a 1992 article in DiscipleshipMagazine which clearly states the movement's vision of itself and guiding principles.Many valuable quotes from McKean also come from sermon tapes and lecture notes, andwe use these as well.We also will cite spoken or written work by other ICC leaders, among them Ferguson (anelder and probably the preeminent theol...
