Leaderboard

I'm not an eyewitness of those years, but I have some info about that time. First, I was in the second Way Corps (1971 - 1973) with a woman whose parents lived in Troy, OH and who raised her and her sister during the 1950s and 1960s to follow VPW's teachings, although they'd discontinued going to headquarters and supporting VPW. I met her father once, and he said they didn't like VP's arrogance, but stayed faithful to The Word (VP's buzz word for his teachings). She went in the Corps because she got hooked on VP's so-called revelation. She stayed in the Corps despite her parents' not liking VPW, and she's still in TWI today. Last year in Orlando, I met a woman from Van Wert, OH. We have a mutual friend who introduced me to her after she learned about my book Undertow. She met me and we talked a couple of hours while she told me stories, including that she had dated Don Wierwille in high school! She showed me her high school year book with her photo in it and Don's photo in it. He was their class president. She remembers her mother saying something was "odd about Wierwille," but she didn't have enough curiosity to find out more. Maybe her mother did, but her mother didn't share more details with her. I have an old Way Magazine from July/Sept.1969. On the cover is a young couple holding hands, walking through a field with a wooded yard in the background. The words, "The Walk of Youth" are below the photo with an arrow pointing right, as if hinting we should open the magazine. That is the title of an article by VPW called, "The Word speaks to the "Now" generation. The Walk of Youth." A key phrase is, "Become an example of the believers" and the article expounds on I Timothy 4:12. As an example, the second article is called, "The Walk of Youth on College Campus," which is about The Way Home down the street from East Carolina University. This is where I was recruited in 1970. The article is a patchwork of little essays by these people: John T. and Mary Somerville (Mary is VPW's second eldest daughter) who were the Way Home "directors" at that time. Later "directors" would be John and Pat Ly*n, who were there when I took PFAL. Other essays are from people who lived in the house and other students who fellowshipped at the house on a regular basis. The next article is by Pete* J. Wad*. I think there are some posts here on GSC that he wrote. He is in Australia now and runs his own Christian group. Walter J. Cum*ins wrote the next article. It's titled, "Walter Cum*ins discusses the walk in darkness," which is about the two gods and how to be born of either seed, etc. The issue has an ad for the 1969 Summer Youth Advance and for a Way family camp in Minnesota. Bernita Jes* has an article about the Oriental Backgroun in the book of Ecclesiastes, and there is a Children's Corner with Audrey Hamilt*n encouraging kids to learn the Word at The Way. The News from Headquarters section includes a new phone number for HQ 419.753.2523. A report on a Pentecost Truth Rally in Columbus with 300 people. Then the Board of Directors met. 480 new PFAL grads were recorded from the previous year. A Renewed Mind camp was held at HQ and a West Coast Women's Advance was held near San Francisco. 29 women came, including Mrs. VPW. I see some familiar faces in the photo of young women who soon afterward entered the First and Second Corps. There are letters of thankfulness near the end, a Bulletin Board with dates of classes and advances, and an Our Times editorial by VPW. Here are a few quotes from it: Opening, "In our day, the denominationally organized bodies are in a position of ecclesiastical desperation. They manifest an acculturated church marked by a conformity of unbelief and bureaucracy. ..." He goes on to bash churches in ways many of us have heard before. At the end, there's an ad for Sunday Evening Fellowship, offering, "Here positive and accurate teaching of The Word by Dr. Wierwille and other teachers. Enjoy bright singing and good fellowship with like-minded believers. Everyone welcome to these non-denominational services." Yikes! I'll refrain from editorial comments of my own on this material. I suspect you already know my opinions, anyway. I'm at http://charleneedge.com Cheers.

Haha, I bet those 3 at the time didn't realize they were doing themselves a favor. If anyone else who knew Fanning and the other 2 please reply. I'm interested in knowing what the "odd" belief was that got them kicked out.

T-Bone, I think it is very interesting to read about the different experiences people had in TWI. For example, my WOW sucked! It was the worse single year of my life. Some people had a great year, some didn't. I thought the AC was a waste of money; what a bunch of sheet! Some people thought it was great. I did have some great times in The Way, but when I left, I left for good. I thought leaders in TWI, had it made. Some may have, others went through hell. So many of us had such a variety of experiences in TWI. If I could turn the clock back, I would have left TWI years before I did.

I like your last words in here, the freedom to think and choose also adding the agree to disagree and examine careful the teaching. While on TWI i didn't with everything they taught over there and I end up arguing with leaders and they reinforced to read only VPW's books and nothing else! Seems like slavery and mind control. Yes, I agree 100% with you on that and likewise my critical thinking process under constant development and is dynamic.

You don't need church, or even religion, to have a strong moral compass. JW's? You might want to PM Raf on that one.

Hi Bapsy, You're not likely to find a church or fellowship where the TWI interpretation of the bible will fit in. You might try a twi spin off or two, but even those are likely to feel weird. When belonging to a group where you can feel like you fit in becomes important to you, more than likely you'll have to decide which things you now believe that you're willing to overlook or change your beliefs. It can help if you find someone in a Christian church that has known and helped people who have left twi. About a decade after leaving, I tried going to a church for a couple of years. One of the associate pastors had known someone in my situation before. We became good friends. It was helpful to me. But eventually (and this friend moved away to take a senior pastor position in another state) I lost interest in churches and the bible altogether. I found other people with whom to feel like I belonged.

sorry to hear about you being a victim but i'm glad you left in '89 i was a dumb facilitator for TWI - at the time of my involvement i was not aware of the abuse and exploitation at the various levels by those who loved the power they had; i am truly sorry for the fact that i supported and endorsed TWI...back then - what mattered was what classes / programs you had, what you did for the ministry, blah blah blah. Grease Spot is a whole lot different - what matters here is that you be yourself and exercise your right to freely think what you want....and folks care for you just because you're another human being. Word Wolf has some good advice - share your experience....maybe start a thread...if that's too intimidating try private message to someone....getting this stuff off your chest does a world of good...

I checked "Other" for why I left, but I thought about checking "Voluntarily - bored." I ended up with "Other" because "bored" didn't really express how I felt. I was depressed and exhausted. My then-husband and I were going through some marital and financial problems, and we were expecting our second child. One night we just decided to skip twig, just once. The next thing we knew, it had been a long time. This was shortly after we had returned from ROA 86 and I seem to remember something about PoP, but I wasn't paying a whole lot of attention because my own immediate issues were so overwhelming. Anyway, when we realized we had missed a lot of meetings, we tried to go back and our twig wasn't meeting any more. Just about everybody in our area had left TWI. We still saw some of them, but we just didn't talk about TWI. I think the others assumed we knew what was going on, but we didn't. It wasn't until just a few years ago that I found GSC and discovered the rest of the puzzle pieces. For what I did after leaving TWI, I checked "Didn't do anything for a long time." Eventually, I did most of the things listed. Briefly tried to rejoin, moved out of the area (concurrent with going through a divorce), was seriously depressed, got counseling, tried a different Christian religious organization, raised a couple of wonderful children, went back to school, got a decent job, and life is pretty good now.

As I understand it, there were always people arriving and leaving. In terms of MASS exits, the first one I'm aware of was shortly after victor paul wierwille's death. That was when chris geer wrote his "Passing of the Patriarch" paper which accused the twi leadership of killing vpw, and gave vague accusations of being "off the Word." (It was written from cg's perspective that vpw was like unto the writers of the New Testament.) http://www.greasespotcafe.com/main2/waydale/waydale-miscellaneous/passing-of-the-patriarch.html Not long after this, there were several reasons different people exited. Ralph D was one of the people who had been approached by women abused by twi top staffers, and he was unable to get any satisfactory answer to it, or any answers other than "Sssshh!" "You question us? You must be possessed!" and "You are now being thrown off grounds. We're posting a guard until you leave." He was one person at the top who questioned things after vpw died. Some questioned (like Ralph) because uncomfortable truths were coming to light. Others questioned because they didn't think l craig martindale had the brains to blow his own nose, let alone run what they thought was God's Ministry. Others had their own reasons (some speculation has included they wanted to have been in charge, so they went off to form their own ministries based on their preferred parts of twi.) Anyway, so sometime in 1985-1986, there was the first big exodus. It was so big that it was noticed by external media. Those of you so inclined can do a little research (I did once), and go to the Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature, and find the article in Christianity Today called "Infighting trims branches at the Way International." It's about 1 page, and was about this split. This in turn led to "the fog years", when even lcm admits he wandered about as if in a fog. In 1988/1989, lcm came out of his fog, and demanded an oath of loyalty to himself PERSONALLY. (Not to "God", not to "God's Word", not even to "The Ministry", but to HIMSELF.) One person who knew him phoned him personally to confirm this was what was meant. "When I asked if this letter was a call to blindly follow him he said I had been doing this all along. I then told him if that's what he thinks he could 'kiss my @$$'. I think I was dropped from the rolls of the Way Corps that next morning." That prompted the biggest mass exit in twi history. 80% of the rank-and-file were all gone, including 80% of the leadership, and virtually the entire research department including its head, Walter Cummins. After that, twi began the process of hemorrhaging members, which lasted until around 1999, when lcm was finally exposed in legal documents as a criminal and a pervert (vpw was never caught legally during his lifetime, he was a criminal and a pervert who was not caught.), there was another exodus from twi. It couldn't be as big as the 1989 one, because so many fewer people were still IN twi. Still, percentage-wise, they lost a sizeable chunk. After that, twi went back to hemorrhaging members again, to the point that their current membership numbers overall (including minors) must be about 3000 (if not less.) So that's the major Exoduses. (Exodi? Exodia?) A) 1985-1986, "infighting trims branches" as some top leaders leave or are kicked out B) 1988-1989 lcm's "line in the sand", 80% leave as lcm demands blind loyalty to himself C) 1998-1999 lcm's ousted by lawsuit and lawyers, followers are fed up and leave

I tell you TWI's talent for stupidity exceeds just about any other corporation out there. With their whole treatment of the "Corps" they've managed to alienate about 95% of the people who took 4 years out of their life to go to their supposed college level training program. What other college can you attend where you are either controlled completely or ostracized? Dictated to as to who you marry? Common sense tells you it's simply ludicrous. Spouse Corps are certainly among those mistreated. A normal rational response to this would be giving TWI the middle finger.

Well Twinky, I finally voted. As far as the level, I checked entered corps but didn't graduate because we left on our "practicum" year after spending two consecutive years in-residence...during which vpw died and pop was read. Interesting time to be in, to say the least. Went WOW, did twig and branch with hubs, and "other" being way home coordinators. What did I do after I left twi? After the lease on the house was up, we moved to another state. Life became wonderful, but not without doubt and despair at times. Life is messy and uneven like that. I got a good job, but not right away...I had to go back to school first. Life isn't all bluebonnets and Bluebell ice cream...sometimes it's fireants and warm Shiner, but it's always good to be out of a cult.

In my experience (1975-1987), corps spouse were always treated like second class citizens. It's like you "by-passed" the corps training and got yourself a corps nametag anyway...and it's s good thing that you have "sp" on that nametag so we know who you are! Loyalty oath indeed! Can you imagine the arrogance that it took to demand such a thing? What a jerk he was.

Great thread Twinky! I checked the box for seriously depressed after leaving, but should add that if there was a box for isolated and traumatized I would have checked that too. I concurr with what Waysider said, the "your the best and love yous" were all just lip service, absolutely fake, a cheap imitiation, and no reflection of God's or Jesus' love. I relocated and ended up in an offshoot for a while, then, I am happy to say, I left there too, a complete retread ministry, same foundation in error. I am happy to be a free agent now, and am thankful my path has lead me here. <_<