Talk:New Testament Christian Churches of America/GA1

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GA Review

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Reviewer: EricLeb01 (Page | Talk) 00:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'll be reviewing this article. As a militant atheist, I had a few laughs, but I had to fail this. I highly recommend you to get a peer review (WP:Christianity has one dedicated to Christian-related articles) before initiating a GAN, because nominations which quick-fail criteria end up slowing down the process. Nevertheless, scratch out things that you complete on this page, and ask questions if you want (I'm watching the page):

Review

GA review (see here for criteria)
  1. It is reasonably well written.
    a (prose): b (MoS):
    See comments section.
  2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.
    a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):
    See comments section.
  3. It is broad in its coverage.
    a (major aspects): b (focused):
    Would require more information on the Church itself, instead of the conspiracies surrounding it. Look at Stanford Memorial Church for a good example.
  4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.
    Fair representation without bias:
    See comments section.
  5. It is stable.
    No edit wars, etc.:
    A few reverts in the past, but seems stable today.
  6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.
    a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):
    No images. Not applicable.
  7. Overall:
    Pass/Fail:
    Too many issues, per Comments section below.

Comments

Prose / MoS:

I copy-edited most of what I saw, though there are a few things I cannot.

  • "...those who had graduated from their own seminary could minister in their churches, and that their ministers could not minister in any non-NTCG churches." -> Quite a wordy sentence, and hard to follow. Find a synonym for "minister" (verb), and try rephrasing the sentence.
    Changed to The NTCG leadership eventually severed their ties with all outside churches, ministers, and ministries. They also distanced themselves from all other denominations by requiring that only those who had graduated from their own seminary could minister in their churches, and that their pastors could not maintain positions in any non-NTCG churches.
    Perfect.
  • "It was later known as New Testament Christian (NTC) College, and is currently known as New Testament Christian Seminary (NTCS)." -> When did these changes occur?
  • "Membership is racially diverse, with about 40% of the congregants being black and significant numbers from Asian or Hispanic backgrounds." -> Would be nice to have a number, else have the term changed to something more specific.
    That's as specific as the source gets.
    Changed to "and others being from Asian or Hispanic" to avoid implying a number.
  • You mention The Dispatch twice, yet give its lieu of operations only the second time. Switch it around.
  • "it is estimated that the church leadership in Graham receives $6 million annually." -> Who estimated this?
    Fully attributed
  • "NTCC does not provide financial statements, and it does not belong to the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability." -> What does not belong to the ECFA?
  • Second sentence of "Finances" is quite a mouthful.
  • "When a minister leaves a church, it is reported that the NTCC absorbs..." -> Who reported this?
    Can't be fixed, the source doesn't say... nevertheless it's worth reporting here
    Attributed to the Dispatch.

* "...however, the missions are given only $300 per month each of these monies..." -> Needs clarification, as I do not understand.

  • Fixed
    Further fixed for structure and variety.
  • "According to county records, Kekel recently filed..." -> When?
  • Quotation in "Beliefs and practices" should be enveloped in a Quote template.
    Done
    Added attributes to the template.

References:

  • Lead is advised to have sources. I believe there is talk about stopping this practice so that the lead can look tidy, but you should source until then.

* "However, internet sources say that there are perhaps 103 churches and 5,000 church members worldwide." -> "Internet sources" can mean anything, and will be treated as non-reliable. Specify.

    • Quote from source: "Internet sources tabulate NTCC to have about 150 churches worldwide, with perhaps five-thousand members." [2]
    Attributed to The Dispatch.
  • Ref #1 links to a pile of documents; you should be referencing individual documents for individual claims, because this just makes you seem lazy.

* Ref #2 and #5 are the same.

NPOV

A few examples of obvious bias:

* "NTCC is an evangelical church with a mission to spread its doctrines to the world." -> Biased tone, possibly libel as it is treating the sourced journalist's opinion as fact.

  • Fixed per discussion below
  • Second and third sentences of Proselytizing section seem to solely be evidence for their wrongdoing. Another attack.
  • Finances section seems to be solely to provide incriminating evidence.
    Merged with criticism section.
    Good for now.
  • Beliefs and practices could be much more neutral.
    Merged with criticism section.
  • "When members leave, their friends who remain within the church shun them, and thus may lose a lifetime of friendships." -> This is being treated as a universal fact.
    Attributed now
    Nicely done.

Please fix these issues, especially the bias, or else this article may be prone for an WP:AFD again. Regards. EricLeb01 (Page | Talk) 02:32, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Additional comments from users

Thanks for the comments and help. I'll work on it as I have time, and you gave a lot of helpful instructions. The neutrality of some of the sentences could only be changed by being untrue to the sources, or leaving the information out. Some of the problems noticed here are due to the nature of the sources, rather than to bias of WP users (mainly myself). Wikipedia can't be in the position of correcting the weight of the reliable sources, their information or their claims, though we can attribute. We have to reflect the sources we have. I'm not surprised that the reviewer detected bias, and some of it can be corrected to his satisfaction. But I'll say again what I said on the talk page: you can't get much less negative sounding (WEIGHT, etc.) without censoring and being untrue to the only reliable sources we have, the Dispatch articles. If this article had been written as a direct reflection of the sources, it would be much more negative sounding, so I guess you could say there is already censorship going on in the NTCC's favor. Quite a lot actually, but I justified it by saying that I got the main facts.

I do not want to modify the appreciation I have for this review, and EricLeb01 did an extensive, thorough and thoughtful job, but I do have to say that some of the comments seem off. For example, Eric said:

"NTCC is an evangelical church with a mission to spread its doctrines to the world." -> Biased tone, possibly libel as it is treating the sourced journalist's opinion as fact.

However, the source says:

Kekel claimed that the Bible is the "pure word of God," and said that when they preach Christ, they are not delivering "an opinion," but something much more authentic. In addition, both men agreed that the NTCC seeks to "change the nature of humanity."

I'm not sure whether the reviewer knew how closely this article already follows its sources. In this example, I don't think we have to question whether the reporter is actually lying. This is what I was saying above. Surely it would give the article a more biased tone to stick closer to the source and say something like "The NTCC is an evangelical church which believes the Bible is the pure word of God and that its mission is to change the nature of humanity by spreading the Gospel."

We should also consider that the source itself may not be biased, but rather good reporting, and that the institution is accurately portrayed. We do not have any reason as Wikipedians to think otherwise, unless someone can come up with a documented reason to question the sources. BE——Critical__Talk 09:16, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There are ways to make non-neutral statements seem neutral. Neutrality on Wikipedia is really about how you word your sentences. I'll give examples below. Reference weight isn't a problem, because, as you said, all sources found were negative (thereby implying that the organization is only notable for their negative views / actions).
Firstly, I find "The NTCC is an evangelical church which believes the Bible is the pure word of God and that its mission is to change the nature of humanity by spreading the Gospel." to be less biased than what I found. It sounds more like a pure statement and refrains from using the words "its doctrines". I admit I did not check your source, so I apologize for labelling it as libel.
"When members leave, their friends who remain within the church shun them, and thus may lose a lifetime of friendships." -> You could make this look like a reported case, saying "There are reports of former members losing friends in the Church following their leave and being shunned from further relationships.", or something of the sort. It makes it look like Wikipedia is not trying to take a side in the matter, and is simply reporting what we hear from these one-sided sources.
To tone down the negative aspect as well, I recommend that you place the Beliefs and practices and Finances (probably rename that to something like Financial distribution) sections as sub-sections for the Criticism section, and perhaps create a new section for what's under the present Criticism section to place under it. This should make the article seem to have a half reserved to explaining the Church itself, and another half for its criticism. I wouldn't mind helping out with the article, if you'd like, as it is fairly interesting. EricLeb01 (Page | Talk) 14:54, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
These are great suggestions, and I'll apply them as soon as I have the time, maybe not today. And of course would love your help with it. If you don't want to read the articles but question what part a particular section is drawing from, I'll try to be around enough to find you some quotes as I did above. Another editor had the complaint that something I originally put in the criticism section were merely what they do, see this version [6]. Also, don't you think people will complain about undue Weight if the criticism section is huge compared to the article? BE——Critical__Talk 18:04, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I'll read the articles later (best to get acquainted with the material), preferably when you get this current stuff done, as I have an FAC to tend to shortly (just waiting on a Peer Review). I'll help out with the prose and neutrality, being a member of the WP:GOCE. I think that the only thing the editor was trying to say was that the claims were not attributed to a source's words, and therefore looked like we were stating that the statements were considered criticisms of the Church. (They are, obviously, but nevertheless.) People will always complain about undue weight in these cases, as I have, and it is for that reason that I'm considering placing an FAQ on the talk page for clarifying this once we complete major improvements. I haven't read the handbooks yet either, but I'm sure we could be able to find some sort of "neutral" information on them to be placed in History or something. EricLeb01 (Page | Talk) 18:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Sounds like a great plan... I like the FAQ idea. Yes, we could find stuff in the handbooks probably... the article used to have a rundown on their doctrines. Ntccxposed recently went mostly offline, probably because of threats, but if you want that background you can find it here. Not an RS though. BE——Critical__Talk 19:42, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Re the finances section. Do you think it's original research to do a mathematical calculation on numbers which are found in the RS? That's all I know is OR. That would be "(or about $43,000 yearly for all 12 missions combined)" BE——Critical__Talk 20:19, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
In this case, unfortunately, it would be OR, as the number you brought up may not be accurate solely based on the information provided in the source. (Smaller things like percentages of a certain number or a unit measurement conversion are normally fine). The pertinent information you were sourcing is still there, though, so removing your calculation doesn't remove much from the article. EricLeb01 (Page | Talk) 22:05, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
You may be correct... would you be insulted if I got a second opinion on that though? It seems so cut-and-dried to me, it's just a calculation which puts the information in context, and doesn't go beyond the information provided in the source (if I'd said each it would be OR because it might not be divided evenly but the combined total is just a straight calculation).... Okay, I put it on the OR noticeboard here. BE——Critical__Talk 23:39, 23 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Not offended, it's a valid concern, and I may be wrong about it. EricLeb01 (Page | Talk) 00:14, 24 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
So they seem to think it's fine in theory. If you really think it's OR we can take it out, but for my part I think it's just multiplication and it does seem to add something to the reader's understanding. BE——Critical__Talk 05:55, 24 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I read their opinion and I'm not opposed to it. Something to keep note of for future reference. EricLeb01 (Page | Talk) 17:39, 24 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I'm going to be gone tomorrow and next day, and maybe can't edit the day after that either. After that time I'll be able to focus more on this article. BE——Critical__Talk 21:51, 24 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Back, but not able to do much at the present... BE——Critical__Talk 19:08, 4 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Nor am I. School and still on that FAC. EricLeb01 (Page | Talk) 19:19, 4 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think that the best thing you could do right now is either nominate this for a peer review or for another GAN. I've failed this already, so I can't really pass it again, but there are still a few issues I think another editor should handle. Your changes are pretty good though, so keep at it. EricLeb01 (Page | Talk) 18:00, 20 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]
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