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James Padgett died on March 17, 1923.
Dr Stone had been his constant
companion, along with Eugene Morgan. Dr Stone took up the challenge
of readying the messages for publication. He decided to create a
foundation for this purpose, but after creating the Leslie R Stone
Foundation (possibly in 1955), he discovered it could not be tax
exempt. This led to the creation of the Foundation Church of the
New Birth (F.C.N.B) which was inaugurated in 1958. The process of
readying the material for publication was very difficult. The messages
were on small notebook pages, in the typically almost unreadable
format that constitutes automatic writing. Over 2500 messages had
been received, probably many more if those from dark spirits were
included - one estimate is that there were 3,500 of those, albeit
very short messages. If one assumes the 2,500 averaged four pages
each, and clearly while some were short, many were of considerable
length, then he was dealing with over 10,000 handwritten pages.
This was a time when typewriters were expensive, and one had to
be a very competent typist to use them, as errors were messy to
alter. Once he had chosen his subject material, this had to be typed
and proofed. Then the printer would prepare the typesetting, and
again proofing was needed. This was also a time when publishing
was very expensive, as lead typesetting was used, from which plates
would be produced. Dr Stone funded all this out of his own resources,
so he continued to work to earn an income. It has been suggested
that Dr Stone received an insurance payment in respect of a personal
injury accident, and applied those funds to the publishing. Dr Stone
was very much loved by all who knew him, and finally passed into
spirit at the age of 90, on the 15th January 1967. (His D.O.B was
10th November 1876)
By this time he had completed two publications, and had contributed
to the third volume. The third volume was completed by John Paul
Gibson while Dr Stone was still alive, and he also subsequently
produced Vol IV in 1972. Initially the messages were published in
1941 (Vol I), 1950 (Vol II) and 1956 (Vol III). Four different titles
were used over the years, and more details about these publications
can be found on this page.
Later these volumes, very very slightly changed (the main pages
appear to use the same printing plates, with some changes to the
introduction and the inclusion of original messages and photos.)
were published by the Foundation Church of the New Birth as "True
Gospel Revealed Anew by Jesus".
At this time (1954-1966) a Jewish medium Dr.
Daniel G. Samuels was receiving a significant volume of messages,
but he seems to have found some (or one) of the individuals difficult
to get along with, and eventually he left the movement, to not be
heard from again. In fact the time and place of his death were not
known till many years after that event. One can only surmise as
to what really happened. Even though he has communicated
with us since his passing, this did not resolve why he left
the movement. In my opinion, it is probable that Dr Samuel's vision
of the nature of the church that would be founded, differed significantly
from the vision of others, especially in the practises that he seemed
to espouse, and which appeared to be based heavily on his Jewish
heritage. He has communicated that he was overly materially minded,
and not well advanced in his soul progression.
In 1967, the reins passed to Rev. John Paul Gibson, and he became
the second head of the F.C.N.B. George Stokes, Kathryn Stokes, Amy
Reza, Mary (Holmes, later Reynolds), Michael Holmes, Russel Higby
and Dan Bowman, met Rev John Paul Gibson when they went east to
be of service to the F.C.N.B., in 1972. Around this time the volumes
were renamed "True Gospel Revealed Anew by Jesus" and
four volumes were available, with the final Vol IV being published
in 1972. These remain the most original source documents of the
Padgett Messages, although it is apparent that some limited editing
(as in leaving out paragraphs rather than altering the meaning,
particularly where these referred to personal matters) occurred
with these, as can be discerned by studying the numerous
duplicated messages.
Jocelyn Harleston moved to the D.C. area after her mother died
(she had taken care of her mother for 5 years) This may have been
in 1980 or 1981. Jocelyn was involved with taking care of the books
after John Paul died in October 1982. She threw many away because
they had been in a storage bin in the basement of the building and
were damaged and moldy.
Some time after Rev. John Paul Gibson died, Rev Bill Reilly came
up from Florida with Victor Summers1, to Washington D.C. at the end
of winter, or early spring in 1983. Kathryn Stokes was invited to
come to D.C. and be ‘secretary’ of the church. Jocelyn
Harleston was in fact the ‘real’ secretary of the F.C.N.B.
At this time Victor Summers became the head of the F.C.N.B.
Holly Bianco and Judy Gebhart came from California and were interested
in working with the church. Jocelyn found a four bedroom house in
Arlington, which is just across the Patomic River from Washington
D.C. The four (Kathryn, Holly, Judy and Jocelyn) moved there in
mid-August, 1983.
Judy wasn’t happy there and moved back to California by the
end of the year. Holly went to visit her sister in Europe, and not
long after she returned, she too went back to California, in the
summer of 1984. George Dunseth, who had come to Washington D.C,
eventually managed to obtain the post that had been piling up at
Benjamin Franklin Station since John Paul had died.
The exact date when Victor Summers loaded as many church supplies
into his car as it would hold, and went across country to California
is not known. This material included the majority of the originals
of the messages. How long Victor was in California is also not known,
before he moved to Florida, but at some point Victor put the Padgett
messages into the public domain. Since Jocelyn felt that Victor
was not a responsible representative of the church, she felt that
we should incorporate another church entity to carry on the work.
It was at the end of 1985 when the Foundation Church of Divine Truth
(F.C.D.T.) was incorporated. Jocelyn was President and Kathryn Stokes
was (on paper) Secretary.
In the fall of 1987, Victor called Jocelyn from Florida to acknowledge
that he wasn’t able to continue being President of the F.C.N.B.
Marc Reza, and his then girlfriend, Angelica (now his wife of more
than 21 years) along with Crystal and Kathryn, went down to Florida
and picked up many of the church supplies which Victor had taken
from DC, and returned them to Arlington, VA.
Annual meetings were held in Kathryn's home, with Dave Lampron,
Bill Reilly, Amy Bolton, Jocelyn, Rev. Bill Carroll and Kathryn
working towards incorporating the new church.
Jocelyn asked Dave Lampron if he would be willing to edit the messages,
and Dave agreed to get involved with that project. But after the
first volume was printed, and work started on vol II, Jocelyn decided
that she didn’t like the editing being done. A discussion ensued
among the trustees which lasted 7 months, by letter and phone. In
the beginning five trustees were in favor of including ‘the
divised questions’ where it was apparent that Mr Padgett had
asked a question, which he didn’t record, and then the spirit
answered it. Two trustees, Jocelyn and Marva Egenberger were against
inserting the questions.
In the spring of 1990, when it was decided a vote needed to be
taken, five Trustees were still in favor of including the questions
and two were still against it. This caused Jocelyn to resign, and
reactivate the F.C.N.B. Jocelyn was thus able to reactivate her
beloved F.C.N.B., and reprint the volumes in the way she felt is
the best, as that is the exact way they were originally delivered.
However the F.C.N.B has maintained its distance from all others
who are not members of their group. Their headquarters are now in
Williamsville, New York. Jocelyn Harleston resigned in November
2008, and Dr. Elizabeth Merano is the current head of the F.C.N.B.
After Jocelyn resigned, the next president was Bill
Reilly. The trustees that remained, united after Jocelyn's resignation
and voted to establish Bill as the president of the F.C.D.T. Bill's
tenure in this position did not last long. Bill's health deteriorated
over the next couple of years. Nearing the end of his mortal life,
he communicated to the trustees over the telephone, but could no
longer attend the annual meetings. Bill died in a nursing home very
near to his son's home in Deltona, Florida on June 30, 1995 at the
age of 76. It was not until his passing into the spirit world that
the trustees, including Amy, Kathryn, and Luke Osei-Kwame (who originally
immigrated from Africa to Maryland in the pursuit of a doctorate
and became a trustee) voted Rev. Dr Dave Lampron in as the next
president of the F.C.D.T. in 1996. He holds that position today,
although the number of trustees reduced by four when the Santa Cruz
based folks decided they would prefer to create their own church
and run that. It further reduced to three trustees, when Rev. Carolyn
Stokes and Rev. Jimmy Walsh resigned similarly to operate the Hawaii
branch church. The current trustees of the F.C.D.T. are Rev. Dr.
Dave Lampron as president, Rev Holly Bianco as the current secretary
and treasurer, and Rev. Dr. Michael Nedbal as the vice president.
1 Victor Summers has communicated almost directly after his
own passing, on November 18th 2011, and also subsequently. He confirmed
he was welcomed, on his arrival, by the Master.
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