Wilbur Glenn Voliva

Early life and education Voliva was born on a farm in Indiana on March 10, 1870. In 1897, he graduated from Hiram College in Ohio with a degree in divinity, and became a minister in Washington Court House. In late 1898 he had considered abandoning his ministry in favor of a legal career, but was handed a copy of Leaves of Healing, a periodical ran by faith healer John Alexander Dowie and became drawn to his teachings. The next year, Voliva left his church in Ohio and traveled to Chicago to join his congregation, becoming an elder of the Christian Catholic Church in April 1899 and being made head of the North Side branch of the church. After engaging in proselytizing work for the church in Chicago and Cincinnati, in 1901 he emigrated to Australia to become overseer-in-charge of the Christian Catholic Church's Australian branch.

Leadership of church In September 1905, Dowie suffered a stroke while preaching to his congregation and left for Jamaica to recuperate, claiming a month in expenses from his followers, and asked Voliva to return to oversee the city of Zion in his absence. Voliva arrived in Zion in February 1906, and discovered that Dowie's extravagant lifestyle, including spending more than on a Chicago townhouse, had left Zion essentially bankrupt. Voliva began writing articles in Leaves of Healing slamming Dowie's corruption and accusing him of polygamy, claiming to have discovered a secret harem in Dowie's Zion mansion and obtaining letters from his wife revealing Dowie planned to leave her for a Swiss woman thirty years younger than him. After a year-long legal battle, Voliva seized control of Zion and was chosen as head of the church, which he then renamed to the "Christian Catholic Apostolic Church."

Voliva first sought to rescue Zion, which had gone into receivership in 1907, from bankruptcy, which he accomplished through a combination of austerity measures and exhorting his followers to donate their possessions to the church. He sought to extend his power in Zion through the Theocratic Party, composed of followers of Voliva, which was opposed by the Independent faction of generally more liberal members of other Christian denominations.. In 1909, after a contentious campaign during which Voliva had labeled the Independents "the Devil's Ticket", who supported "free theatre", doctors, and dancing among other perceived evils, the Independents won that year's municipal elections. In response, Voliva accused the Independents of voter fraud and threatened to use violence to remain in office, but was forced to relinquish control after 300 Independents lead by the Independent mayor-elect stormed Zion's city hall.

Flat Earth and other views

From 1914, Voliva gained nationwide notoriety by his vigorous advocacy of the flat Earth doctrine, holding a sermon where he introduced his congregation to the idea. That year, he had ordered one of his subordinates, Anton Darms, to search the Bible for verses proving the Earth was flat, which he published in Leaves of Healing in 1916. Darms was also put in charge of the city's church-run school system, where he mandated the teaching of the flat earth.

He offered a widely publicized $5,000 challenge for anyone to disprove the flat Earth theory, but due to what Voliva saw as the "appalling ignorance" of any challengers he never paid out anything. In 1923 Voliva became the first evangelical preacher in the world to own his own radio station, WCBD, which could be heard as far away as Central America. His radio station broadcast his diatribes against round Earth astronomy, and the evils of evolution. He was quoted about the Sun as follows:

The idea of a sun millions of miles in diameter and away is silly. The sun is only across and not more than from the earth. It stands to reason it must be so. God made the sun to light the earth, and therefore must have placed it close to the task it was designed to do. What would you think of a man who built a house in Zion and put the lamp to light it in Kenosha, Wisconsin? He undertook several extended journeys to foreign countries in the late 1920s and early 1930s to spread his ideas. Voliva also predicted the end of the world would come in 1923, 1927, 1930, 1934 and 1935.

Voliva spent most of his time in Florida where he hoped to establish another religious colony, but after being diagnosed with terminal cancer, Voliva made a tearful public confession to his followers that he had misappropriated church funds for his personal use and committed other misdeeds. He died shortly thereafter on October 11, 1942 (though he had previously stated that he would live to 120 due to his diet of Brazil nuts and buttermilk ), and the church all but dissolved. A small remnant was reorganized under the leadership of Michael Mintern. It was later renamed "Christ Community Church."