Dwell Community Church is a Cult

Dwell Community Church is a Cult Explore with us how such abuse arises within Xenos-Dwell.

Dwell Community Church changed its name from Xenos Christian Fellowship in December 2020 after years of negative press and accusations by former members of incidences of abuse.

10/27/2023

The most recent response by Senior Pastor Ryan Lowery to allegations of control and spiritual abuse resulting from the long held practices of Dwell Community Church is problematic for a number of reasons. Church leadership continues to insist that hundreds of stories brought by former members of experiences within the church that resulted in enduring, life-long trauma are “exaggerations,” “misunderstandings,” or “lies.” He states in his response that his church wishes those raising voices of concern against the organization “the best.”

Leaving a high control or abusive organization can be an incredibly painful and life-altering experience, and yet hundreds of members of have made the difficult decision to leave or were excommunicated or shunned when they failed to meet the group’s often untenable standards. These are individuals who joined a church out of their deep longing for a relationship with God and left with the message of Dwell leaders ringing in their ears: if you leave here, you leave God; if you leave here, you answer the call of Satan, you arrogantly reject spiritual authority, you tear down your beloved relationship with the almighty, you give up the good fight, you cannot cut it with the spiritual elite who have given up more than you, if you leave here you lose the only community that will ever truly love you and the only place where you may find purpose and meaning and true peace. If you leave here, you lose your friends, you lose your family, you lose the years you gave to this church, you lose your hope and your certainty. IF YOU LEAVE HERE WE WISH YOU THE BEST.

Here is a clip from IndoctriNation Podcast with Rachel Bernstein of David Hayward - better known by his online persona nakedpastor - where David describes the loss he experienced in leaving a church as well as the pain he has ministered to in others who have experienced this spiritual trauma.

Dwell Community Church fosters an environment that makes this crushing spiritual trauma an inevitability for many of its followers. The church reels in young people and takes advantage of their idealism and pure devotion to God, later wishing them the best as they leave the group lost, broken, and alone. Rather what Ryan Lowery perhaps meant to say in his response was, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/indoctrination/id1373939526?i=1000632567307

https://rss.com/podcasts/spiritwatch/

https://leavingdwell.com

https://www.xenosisacult.com

https://www.dwellchurchcolumbusisacult

10/26/2023

Here’s what the senior pastor of Dwell Community Church (formerly Xenos Christian Fellowship) has to say about the trauma many of us have shared related to our experiences in the church. I personally have never spoken to Ryan Lowery in my life, but he seems to know quite a bit about my “exaggerated” role in his church as well as the lies about my experiences there, but don’t worry, he wishes us the best.

Is this what your God looks like, Ryan?

https://app.frame.io/presentations/29e26cc0-cee8-4cda-a80c-ae146cf16e91?fbclid=IwAR1kkd6PT9jOOC6qASAudVGQp3brD0VcQm7C4Qe73wxYhhNJTIfX3yo3EL0

People continue to raise their voices against the abusive nature of Dwell Community Church (formerly Xenos Christian Fel...
07/07/2023

People continue to raise their voices against the abusive nature of Dwell Community Church (formerly Xenos Christian Fellowship) in Columbus, Ohio.

We urge those both within and without the Columbus megachurch to reflect on the destructive spiritual abuse that has been inflicted on members of this so-called “high commitment” church. And we continue to ask, where is the high commitment to the limitless grace of Christ? Where is the integrity and humility of the Servant? Where is the hope and love of your Savior?

https://www.dwellchurchcolumbusisacult.com

https://www.xenosisacult.com

https://rss.com/podcasts/spiritwatch/

https://www.podpage.com/indoctrination/

05/28/2023

There has been a lot of talk lately about Dwell Community Church (formerly Xenos Christian Fellowship) expanding through church planting to new markets within the Ohio area and beyond. The latest is an announcement that elders from the controversial megachurch are targeting a church plant in Orlando, Florida. The group has also been known to function within Young Life organizations and through other church plants in Cincinnati and Pittsburgh. We hope that leaders and members alike will take seriously the call to reconsider the toxic theology and practices that have wounded countless individuals over the years the organization has existed in Columbus, Ohio. As author and reverend Dante Stewart puts it, we must be willing to consider where these things come from, for they can’t but come from toxicity in our theology. If theology is used as an excuse to disregard the suffering and utter annhilation of faith of those who encounter your church, then that theology is dead.

https://www.dwellchurchcolumbusisacult.com

https://leavingdwell.com

https://www.xenosisacult.com

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-bible-for-normal-people/id1215420422?i=1000612580356

Xenos is a Cult.

If you’ve been there, you know.
05/13/2023

If you’ve been there, you know.

11/29/2022

In the latest interview with Spiritwatch Ministries, Rafael Martinez speaks with Megan McGowan about the deep trauma she carries as a result of her experiences in Dwell Community Church (formerly Xenos Christian Fellowship). Megan describes feeling a strong faith and security in God since childhood, a faith that would eventually lead her to the Columbus megachurch which she joined in her early twenties. During her time in the group, Megan describes struggling with depression, her experience and the church response when she was sexually assaulted by someone she felt to be a trusted friend, and eventually being excommunicated from the church for crossing church-mandated physical boundaries with her boyfriend at the time, now husband.

Megan shares her story with a raw vulnerability that throws into bold relief the utter spiritual annhilation that so many have experienced at the hands of this so-called church. In this segment, you can hear Megan describe the desolation she felt after being excommunicated from her spiritual family, an ostracism that eventually resulted in a partial hospitalization for suicidal ideation. As with so many others, Megan was told by church leaders that her repentance was insincere and that she would need to hit “rock bottom” before she could truly repent and return to the group.

You can also hear Megan describe how facilitators in her partial hospitalization program commented on how multiple former Xenos members had been through their program in prior months. We also note that Megan’s outright requests for help from her church leaders regarding su***de (which were laughed off) and ultimate excommunication came in late 2016, only six months after Elder James Rochford and his wife, Duyen Rochford, excommunicated another young girl with mental health concerns who took her own life as a result.

This is not the love of God. The love of God stands up against these atrocities. The love of God is not in a paper on the church website or a teaching on church discipline. You are not saving souls, you are destroying them.

https://rss.com/podcasts/spiritwatch/706280/

https://www.dwellchurchcolumbusisacult.com

https://www.xenosisacult.com

https://leavingdwell.com

Dwell Community Church 4th Street Pavillion Dwell Community Church 4th Street Pavillion Dwell Community Church 4th Street Pavillion Dwell Community Church 4th Street Pavillion

10/10/2022

Dwell Community Church (formerly Xenos Christian Fellowship) emphasizes select attributes of God that the church believes to embody “high commitment” Christianity with a focus on “saving souls” and “church discipline” to the detriment of other attributes of God. The group’s co-founding pastor, Dennis McCallum, has long preached that the church’s mission is more akin to an elite military force than a refuge for family, healing, or worship. It is this dissection and isolation of the attributes of God that results in the group’s ideological, authoritarian practices of control, and is no surprise that the church is most focused and effective in its undue influence of the young.

In contrast to this deformed and idolatrous image of God, Walter Brueggemann - renowned Old Testament scholar and progressive Christian theologian - reminds us that the antidote to the idolatry of destructive doctrine in the church is the active reflection on the full attributes of God. To embody and feel deeply the poetic imagery of God’s nature as both nursemaid and conquering serpent over death is to begin to open what has long closed off through its stifling and selective portrayal of God.

09/30/2022

Dwell Community Church (formerly Xenos Christian Fellowship) embodies many of the core elements of cult expert Steve Hassan’s BITE Model of Authoritarian Control. This recent teaching by Senior Pastor Conrad Hilario is a clear example of the church attempting to do damage control as a rising number or ex-members step forward with serious claims of spiritual abuse and those within the church struggle to make sense of the conflicting information coming from inside and outside of the group.

Here is just one example, but we encourage you to explore Hassan’s BITE Model and identify patterns of undue influence for yourself.

HILARIO: We should resist accusations that God has abandoned our church… or that God is disciplining us because there is something fundamentally wrong with what we are doing.

BITE MODEL: Thought Control #7 Teaching thought-stopping techniques which shut down reality testing by stopping negative thoughts and allowing only positive thoughts.

QUESTIONS: Why should we resist the idea that God is disciplining us or the church? How do we know whether something is or is not fundamentally wrong in our church? What are the experiences of people inside and outside of the church? If something was fundamentally wrong, how would we find out about it? What would indicate that something is fundamentally wrong? How would we address issues that we found to be fundamentally wrong? What do other religious thinkers have to say about these concerns? What do other pastors or churches in the area think? Are outsiders incapable of forming an accurate view of the group? Are only those within the church capable of accurately understanding the righteousness of its mission? How can we tell the difference between legitimate concerns and persecution?

http://dwellchurchcolumbusisacult.com

https://leavingdwell.com

https://www.xenosisacult.com

https://rss.com/podcasts/spiritwatch/

https://freedomofmind.com/cult-mind-control/bite-model/

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1390 Community Park Drive
Columbus, OH
43229

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