Leaderboard

I doubt it. He's too good for us. And the slavery apologetic is rather common. It's telling that he ignores female slaves and foreign slaves from his discussion, as well as the notion of children born into slavery through no fault of their own, being kept by the slavemaster if the father goes free. There has been, there and here, no response to the obvious immorality of that law. Dan also, astonishingly, seems to be making the case that Old Testament slavery is morally preferable to the ability to declare bankruptcy. So. Ok. Gays are ok as long as they don't f***. Thanks, Dan.

When I first became involved in the early 1970's, everything was freewheeling. We had spontaneous fellowships, picnics, potlucks, bar hopping recruitment events, and so on. We had fun. The commitment aspect ramped-up slowly. As time went on, the expectation of commitment became such that you were seen as dead weight if you weren't interested in taking on more responsibility. Training program recruitment became more and more prevalent. I opted for a program that was touted as a way to gain 2 years of in-depth, in-residence leadership training and then return home more qualified as a leader. Maybe that's what B.G. Leonard had in mind. I never took his class (the forerunner of what would become VPW's PFAL) so I don't really know. What I really got was a chance to see what life is like in a religious commune. There was very little formal training of any sort..... leadership, scriptural or otherwise. Every waking moment was controlled, when you awoke, when you slept, what and when you ate, even if and when you were permitted to have intimate time with your spouse. It was not at all like what I had signed on for nor did it resemble my earlier experiences. Quite frankly, it was a bait and switch to recruit drones for "the ministry". You couldn't question it, you couldn't voice disagreement. You had to keep you mouth shut and do what you were told, lest you be accused of being weak or devil possessed. For people who only experienced the first part of my description or who experienced an augmented version of the training programs, I can see why they might be at a loss to understand why one can't just walk away and forget it all. It's ingrained in the psyche, like layers of an onion. Peel away one layer and another appears to take its place. I don't think you can really understand the concept unless you've experienced it. I give those people the benefit of a doubt and hope they'll be kind enough to do the same for me.