Southend-on-Sea, England: Kung Fu master Tony Anthony and Avanti Ministries

[stubbe78]

It is evidence that he is unwilling to answer the question. It is evidence that he is evasive

That it is, but to reveal him as a liar, we need a lot more. Not to say it's totally useless, it's just not enough to persuade people who believe his story

[stephenprunetti]

On Tony Anthony's facebook page, someone's put a link up to Bullshido. Relieved to see that more and more people can see through his ridiculous lies.

[littleoldme]

OK I've been holding back here for a while but I'm going to lay my cards on the table re my concerns

I am not really concerned if Tony Anthony is a liar and a fantasist who believes his own lies and who is genuinely committed to his own brand of Christianity. There are a lot of deluded, well meaning people in the world and if he is one of them I couldn't really care less.

I am concerned about the fact that he as claimed to have murdered and seriously injured people as a hired thug and as a generally violent man, that he visits lots of schools and tells his story and yet nobody seems to have run the appropriate checks on him that would be usual for anyone having that kind of access to children.

He says that he believes that he should have spent much longer in prison than he did and yet he seems not to have presented himself at any police station so that he can receive the justice that he says he deserves.

What concerns me the very most is that elements of his own story, specifically those concerning very serious crimes, dovetail quite neatly with some of the life stories of his fellow evangelists at Avanti Ministries in such a way that leaves me extremely concerned

Let's look at Jamie Kidd

Having left school with no qualifications and going through life feeling like a failure, Jamie decided to join the army. He went through 33 weeks of gruelling training to become one of Britain's elite paratroopers, one of the toughest and most respected of regiments in the world.


He was now travelling the world and had money, friends and a new lifestyle fuelled with violence, alcohol and prostitutes. Two near death experiences, one during the invasion of Iraq, the second through a parachute malfunction left Jamie evaluating his life and searching for answers.



After 8 years as a paratrooper and with his marriage in trouble, Jamie left the Army and trained as a bodyguard heading for the Middle East.



However, Jamie's plans were brought to a grinding halt in a humbling life changing way.


Jamie is now an international evangelist and has been travelling the U.K and the world for the last two years telling people about the amazing news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Jamie has spoken to different people from many walks of life, including prisons, schools, outreach events and the military.
Jamie joined Avanti after meeting Tony at an outreach event back in January 2007, and soon after joined the team as a full time evangelist.


He is also the co-ordinator for the 'Release' evangelism training and Avanti's military ministry.

(emphasis mine)

source: http://www.avantiministries.com/evan..._biography.php

we can see that Jamie also evangelises to children

YouTube - A Soldiers Story

more to follow ...

[littleoldme]

Now, let's look at John Lawson

My name is John Lawson and I was born in Glasgow in 1966 and spent the first three years of my life there before my Parents moved to South Africa in 1969. Ten years later after a family Trauma my parents split up. My father remained in South Africa and my mother had no option but to move my brother and I back to the UK.


We moved to the roughest housing estate in Europe (Drumchapel, just outside Glasgow) and that is where I learned to use violence for the first time to solve a situation!


A few years later we moved to Merseyside and I got interested in Martial Arts and became pretty good at it. I then started work as a bouncer and then moved into bodyguard work. I got involved with a highly professional group of ex-soldiers from various countries and we became a great team. Our company would use us to clean up troubled nightclubs. "Hit them Hard and move on" was our Motto.


It was not long before I ended up doing some serious debt collecting for some of our close protection clients, which then led us into choosing our own 'Jobs'. I was soon involved in international kidnapping of men that had stolen from some of our clients. I became embroiled in a world of Shotguns, kidnapping and Money! I made a lot of cash and money was my God.


Subsequently, I ended up in prison serving a 5 year sentence for extortion.


My wife left me, my home was sold and all my worldly possessions gone! I did not care, I was so arrogant I figured I would do another job when I get released and be back on top. It was the persistence of a Nigerian friend in Prison that led me one night in February 2005 to the Christian Fellowship. To be honest, what interested me after many months of my friend asking me to go along was the cakes and biscuits that the Pastor brought in.


I amazingly encountered God that night as other hardened criminals sang Gospel songs. I wept like a baby behind the song sheets as I felt a sweep of emotion overcome me. I woke the next day in my cell and I just felt that everything was going to be okay, and I had an amazing sense of peace. I read the story of Jesus at the well with the Samaritan woman in the Gospel of John, chapter 4 and I was intrigued, and as I read more I felt God very presence in my cell. I was excited the following week as I headed back to the Fellowship. The combination of reading Tony's book, my mother's prayers, the prison Pastor and most importantly the Grace of God led me to turn away from my old life and surrender to Jesus.



Now, I realize that the greatest place I could ever have gone to was prison! There are no walls that can ever hold me again for I am free indeed!!! My Mother sent me Tony Anthony's book in Prison and I was deeply affected by it. I could not believe it when a few months later he came to my Prison to share his testimony.


I have been out of prison since May 2007 and The Lord Jesus Christ Has blessed me in so many ways. Now here I am working with Tony and travelling around the world Proclaiming the Gospel, going back into prisons and planting the seed that God will nourish and bring forth. God has amazing plans for all our lives and I thank Him every day for saving a wretch like me! . My desire, God willing, is to continue to God's work and fulfill the command of Jesus Christ in Mark 16.15 to go out and preach the Gospel to all nations!

(emphasis mine)
source: http://www.avantiministries.com/evan..._biography.php

more on Mr Lawson

I got involved in the security industry straight from school. I was always interested in Martial arts and I guess like a lot of boys my age were turned onto it by Bruce Lee. I trained for a few years in different styles, eventually settling in a style called Bushido Buda Wasa. I was also interested in Firearms due to my upbringing in South Africa. I had always wanted to be a bodyguard but for many years I was content in the Security Industry. I worked as a bouncer for many years in Manchester and Merseyside and then in Edinburgh. This kind of work lead me into some bodyguard training and every now and then a job would come up. They were few and far between and because of my married life I was unable to travel extensively.

However I loved the excitement when the phone would ring and my friend would say there was a job working with the Rolling Stones during their UK tour and other big stars. I also protected some rich clients in London who had enemies for whatever reason. The job lacked the excitement I thought it would. In all honesty most of my time was spent sitting outside hotel rooms, and escorting clients to mundane places.

I worked as part of a four man team and we became very close. There was an ex Para, an ex legionnaire and an ex South African Special Forces Guy. We soon got into a bit of debt collecting from our clients and earned a reputation as guys who could deliver...we had no fear.

Soon our main source of income was from retrieving money from Gangsters who had ripped other gangsters off. Again the jobs were only every now and then and in-between I also held normal 9-5 security work as well as working as a bouncer at weekends. I started getting involved with some real heavy work, involving shotguns and kidnappings of these gangsters. I remember thinking I was doing a good thing as one of my team told me about a drug dealer in his town. He said the guys was peddling drugs to kids and flashing large sums of cash around in the pub. I thought we would kill two birds with one stone. I was going on holiday soon and needed to pay for it, so I thought great, take this drug dealers money then threaten him to get out of town. So we planned it and went round at 2am with balaclavas and shotguns and relieved him of his drug money. Even better he could not go to the cops and I had enough money to pay for a great holiday. Next day the Drug dealer moved out of town and I felt like I had done a service to the community. How arrogant!

We would often disguise ourselves as police officers and kidnap people in broad daylight by “placing then under arrest”. Our job was to locate these guys and then plan to bring them to account in front of the people they had stolen from. I justified what I was doing by saying “well they deserve it”. Sometimes it would mean going abroad to find these guys and on one such occasion it was going to lead to murder. We were talking vast sums of money involved, millions of pounds. We decided that the only way we would be safe after the job was to shoot the intended victim. I was going to be the one who pulled the trigger and I was ready for that. We even went scouting for a location to bury him. The man to this day still does not know how close he came to death! However the Lord had other plans and was not prepared to allow me to become a murderer.

I got involved in a personal situation at home where a friend of mine was being threatened by his partners ex husband. This guy had ripped her off and now refused to pay back the money. By now we were very experienced and thought we were totally untouchable. We paid this guy a visit and threatened to shoot him. Of course he was a “civilian” and ran straight to the police. A month later I found myself in a police station! I was sentenced to 4yrs for attempted extortion and then given another 15months for refusing to testify against my mates.

In Prison everything changed. My wife met someone else, my home was sold to pay for the court case and the proceeds of crime people took all my money. I was a fool and I could see that but I thought I would just get out of prison and rob a few more gangsters and get back on top. I still didn’t get it.

I was in prison for about two months when a Nigerian guy called Tony who was in for fraud started talking to me in the prison yard. We got on ok but he used to really annoy me with talk about Jesus. He kept asking me on a Thursday to come to the Prison Fellowship. He bugged me, I thought if he asks me one more week I will smash him up. However the following week Tony asked me again to go to the fellowship ... I reluctantly agreed to go just to stop myself from hitting him. That night at 7pm in Feb 2005 I put my name down to go to the stupid meeting. When my other mates asked where I was going I just lied to them. I did not want them to think I was going soft.

Well as I walked into the prison chapel, I was greeted by a stranger called Duncan Strathdee. He opened his arms and hugged me. I was taken by surprise after all here I was in a tough high security jail and men just did not hug each other. I thought if this namby pamby Christian dude hugs me again I would break his Jaw.

We sat down in a semi circle of chairs and Duncan handed out lyric sheets then sat down and got out his guitar. There was something about this guy, I could see the goodness flowing out of him. He seemed so happy, considering he came from Dunblane, the community where that evil gunman went into the primary school and shot all those children and teachers. Duncan was a pastor there and was deeply affected by that tragedy. He found it a real struggle to go back into prison fellowship after that. Thank the Lord he did.

So anyway, we started to sing gospel songs and I hid behind the song sheets and began to sob like a baby..... real tears, I was in pieces. Something washed over me, a powerful feeling of emotion. I was amazed as I watched the other guys singing with such joy for the Lord. At the end of the service Duncan hugged me again and I did not break his jaw. I went back to my cell that night and cried more. I feel to my knees and screamed at God to just leave me alone... I did not want to feel weak and vulnerable. You see the lord wanted to touch my life and the only way to make me listen was to break me down, strip me bare and start again. The following day I started to read the Bible and I just became aware that everything was going to be ok from now on. It made the rest of my time bearable in prison. I remember reading about Jesus at the well with the Samarian woman and that story has now become very special to me. Prison was the best thing to happen to me. I have been out of prison for a year now and the Lord has blessed me in so many ways. I would love to tell you about it sometime.

God bless you for now.

Yours in Christ

John Lawson

(emphasis mine)
source: http://www.destinyedinburgh.com/real...in_prison.aspx

[littleoldme]

There's also Renton Baker

an interesting man who apparently was a violent thug and football hooligan who has yet to have a bio section on the Avanti site (I think I remember one, has it been removed?)

anyway, linky here
http://www.avantiministries.com/evan...entonbaker.php

also interestingly Mr Baker is featured in this article
http://www.aboutmyarea.co.uk/East-Lo...Baptist-Church
which has a link to another organisation that he is involved with

Tough Talk

Power Lifters, Body Builders, Ex Bouncers & Debt Collectors, Ex Villains and Hardmen Tell Their Amazing Stories

http://bumblebeeman.enixns.com/~tough7/index.php

which seems to be under development but is a site representing thugs, violent criminals and power lifters and bodyguards (bizarre how they classify them all together - presumably martial artists will soon be added to the list) who now preach the gospel instead of pursuing a life of crime / body building. or something

Actually I do believe that Mr Renton's bio has been removed, in the old one he claimed to have been a notorious Arsenal and Luton football hooligan called "the Guvenor"

edited to add an interesting interview with Mr Renton - apparently he was involved with drugs dealing and organised crime
http://community.godfuel.org/media/4...ie_and_Renton/


I just think it's interesting that 3 of TA's close associates in Avanti Ministries were involved in serious violent criminal activities, 2 of them were involved in debt collection and working as body guards, also work / travel to the Middle East features in these stories.

I don't understand what it all means

It could all be lies and fantasies, it could be that they were involved in some kind of organized criminal enterprise together, maybe they were all just coincidentally involved in similarly violent criminal acts and travelled to the same parts of the world and somehow found an alternative (and it would appear frankly lucrative) source if income from preaching the gospel in their own unusual kind of way.

I do feel worried that people, some of whom have only recently been released from prison and seem never to have been brought to account for the serious crimes they claim to have committed, are touring the world preaching to large groups of people including children.

I think there's something very seriously wrong here.

[stubbe78]

Littleoldme: I agree with you. Still, the discussion about him being a liar is important. It is important, while it is the only way to get people to have a critical view. A critical view makes people wonder a little more over the strange details, like why has he not been sentenced for all those murders.
I would guess that his own answer would be that his position as a bodyguard granted him diplomatic immunity. People would nod and hold it for plausible. That is why, it is important to find hard evidence that he is a liar

[littleoldme]

[color=#cccccc]stubbe78[/COLO"]No BS MMA and Martial Arts - View Profile: [email protected]@[email protected]@View Profile: stubbe78</title>@@[email protected]@stubbe78

sure

Also I appreciate that different things would be important for different people

Just saying how it is for me and expressing my concerns

We already have another Christian posting here who claims that Tony stole his work, which to me is pretty damning.

I'm just much more concerned about the organised and violent crime links, but then that's a subject I'm interested in

Was reading up about La Famila Michoacana early this morning and their particular brand of "muscular Christianity" involving serious organized crime and I just thought, what the hell, I'll post my concerns about Tony Anthony and lay my cards on the table, not that I think him and his associates are comparable, but just reminding myself that sometimes those weird combinations of crime and religion can flourish.

Whatever the truth turns out to be I sense it will be one of those instances of truth being stranger than fiction.

[stephenprunetti]

Terraform. I wholly agree. Tony Anthony is just playing for time. Why will it take until the end of November to answer some pretty basic questions? Questions that i asked him, and Malcolm Down, over two years ago.

It would take him only a few hours to post his answers on his website. His complete lack of response speaks volumes.

The fact that the email links on the Avanti website are still down, after two weeks, also says a lot.

Tony Anthony is waiting, as he did last time, for the activity on the Bullshido forum to die down. Then he'll breathe a sigh of relief, and carry on travelling the world, telling his pack of lies life-story, and selling his 'biography.'

It is now firmly on record, as confirmed by both Malcolm Down and Angela Little, that there were no checks of any kind to substantiate the claims made in 'Taming the Tiger.' Belief in Tony Anthony's story is entirely a matter of faith.

Littleoldme. I'm glad that you have voiced your concerns. I have no idea if any of Tony's fellow evangelists (or indeed, Tony himself) have undergone the correct procedure and been through the necessary checks before visiting schools, colleges, etc. I would have thought that this would be required from anyone, let alone people with (self-confessed) criminal pasts. Claiming to now be a Christian, is just not good enough.

There are a lot of people who have seen right through Tony Anthony's lies, and many more expressing concern about his claims. This is evident from some of the book reviews on Amazon, comments on his Youtube videos, and the fact that his Wikipedia page was removed. I have seen sites in Spanish, Italian and German that have posts from people expressing their concerns.

I urge anyone who would like answers to the many questions that still remain unanswered, to keep the heat up. Don't let Tony Anthony squirm his way out of this as he managed to do two years ago.

[bigguy1]

It is interesting that his web site does not allow contact with 1) any of the evangelists cited as his associates 2) the church's he is scheduled to go to. This is highly unsusual, since every other Christian ministry posts their schedule well in advance so that people can attend the meetings. Doesn't it seem strange that this information is missing from Avanti? Yes, you guessed it, he doesn't want those inviting him or other key people to know about Bullshido and / or the extent to which he has fabricated his book with pure fantasy.

[PDA]

There are a few avenues im presently exploring. I cant post anything about them yet or even give hints for obvious reasons.
Not a hope in hell im going to let him squirm out of this.
When (and i do mean WHEN) he is exposed i will certainly offer my forgiveness.

[Denny Mac]

It is interesting that his web site does not allow contact with 1) any of the evangelists cited as his associates 2) the church's he is scheduled to go to. This is highly unsusual, since every other Christian ministry posts their schedule well in advance so that people can attend the meetings. Doesn't it seem strange that this information is missing from Avanti? Yes, you guessed it, he doesn't want those inviting him or other key people to know about Bullshido and / or the extent to which he has fabricated his book with pure fantasy.

[bigguy1]

Ask Tony how he acquired 99% of the material he is now using around the world. Plagiarism is a civil offence. The only reason he has not been sued? There is a Biblical mandate not to do so. Tony can put this issue right with a public apology, and a full acknowledgement on all his material as to its source. Now that you know this, you too are an accessory to the fact.
Cheers
Julian

[Denny Mac]

Ask Tony how he acquired 99% of the material he is now using around the world. Plagiarism is a civil offence. The only reason he has not been sued? There is a Biblical mandate not to do so. Tony can put this issue right with a public apology, and a full acknowledgement on all his material as to its source. Now that you know this, you too are an accessory to the fact.
Cheers
Julian

There is also a biblical mandate to get this sorted together in private. This is the wrong place to be fleshing out this issue. I know Tony has tried to resolve this issue with you and there are two sides to a story. I am PMing you number, if you are man enough then call me. And I am in no way an accessory to using your material as i do not use it, teach it, promote it or sell it in New Zealand.

Cheers

[bigguy1]

Sure. Call me. 006495850201.
Ultimately, however, the ball is in Tony's court. As per my last thread, he knows, and has know all along, what it would take to put this issue right. As per Jesus' teaching in Matthew 18, this issue has become public because of Tony's continued use of the materials without apology and acknowledgment.

As for two sides of the story? Let me tell you my side.

What I am about to say is not going to be peppered with Christian niceties and platitudes. I intend to say it like it is and was.

When I first met Tony, he was running children's programs for local churches. He had no theological training and no resources of his own whatsover. He couldn't even write his own book. Angela Little wrote it for him. Then, all of a sudden, he acquires a library of resources which clearly would have taken theological training and decades to build and research. Doesn't this strike you as a bit odd? How could he write all these resources in a few short months, as a children's worker, without experience and theological training?

I will tell you. He acquired my materials through deceit and trickery. He was given the opportunity to use the resources without charge and with permission, as long as acknowledged the fact, and didn't change the content, but he refused on all counts.

When asked how he could justify how he acquired them, and how he could continue using them without permission or acknowledgement, his answer was "I thought about all you wrote before you came along. So, really all you did was write down what I already knew." Sometimes he would argue, quite unbiblically, that "all Christian material belongs to God and is free for any Christian to use if it advances the Kingdom." In the end, his response changed to "we wrote the materials together." And off he trotted into the sunset.

Let me assure everyone who reads this thread: Tony Anthony had absolutely no input into the resources he plagiarised and is currently using.

In the end, and after a long period of time, my board, against my wishes, gave Tony permission. Tony, of course, was thrilled. In God's eyes, though, the offense against his brother had already been committed.

Can I tell you how I felt about Tony's actions towards me, before he was given permission? I felt invaded, plundered, betrayed, cheated, and deceived by Tony. To this day, he remains unrepentent. He has made absolutely no attempt to put right the wrong.

My only consolation (and no little one at that) is that God is using the gospel presentation I authored, now called 'Think' by Tony, to save souls, and for this I am grateful.

In summary, Tony's testimony is built on criminal activity, and, from my experience with him, sad to say, his testimony goes on.

Julian

[stephenprunetti]

Tony Anthony is a Liar, a Fraud and apparently, and unsurprisingly, a Plagiarist.

Hi Denny Mac.

Contrary to what you say about the email links at the Avanti site, they are broken, and have been since at least the 10th of October. Go and check them now, i can assure you, you are wrong. I check them every day, they've been down for weeks. I've contacted Avanti several times to ask them why this is. Maybe you could call them to see if you get a better answer than me. As i've already posted on here some weeks ago, i asked a computer expert why they might be broken. He said, because of the length of time they've been down, it looks as if the administrator or web-master of the Avanti site has removed them. Simple as.

I wonder why that might be? Any ideas on that one, Denny Mac? I'd be interested to know what you think.