Call for inquiry into 'cult'

The Western Mail/April 28, 2004
By Gareth Morgan

A group awarded £180,000 of public funding demonised homosexuals and once threatened spontaneous combustion was the penalty for those who were excommunicated, an AM claimed yesterday.

Ceredigion AM Elin Jones has again questioned the funding being given to the Template Foundation, an organisation listed in a book on cults.

The Foundation, previously known as the Emin, got the Objective One funding to create a residential centre near Llandysul.

Yesterday in the National Assembly Ms Jones quoted from a group document called Standards of Behaviour, which said "At no time will homosexuality, lesbianism, transvestism, nymphonic or any other unnatural condition or freak practice ... be permitted."

The document also warns that, "It is against God and creation to worship any symbol in an upside down condition, or to perform any ceremony backwards. Any offender will be exorcised and excommunicated. This can cause death by spontaneous combustion, petrification and electrical gangrene."

Ms Jones questioned whether the group was conforming with the Assembly's statutory duty to uphold equal opportunities. She called on First Minister Rhodri Morgan to order an inquiry into the group's beliefs, but he sidestepped her request.

Last night Colin Cook, who manages the Template Foundation Centre, near Llandysul, said, "These quotes are from a book from the 1970s and that book was a mistake.

"You should not take something from the past and apply it to the modern organisation. We could not and do not hold such beliefs."

Ceredigion County Council said it supports the idea of a holiday and recreation centre run by the Template Foundation.