sprawled out

i was anti-church before twi--which was one of the reasons i was attracted to twi to begin with. after i left, the idea that i would go back to anything even remotely like church never even crossed my mind--i was never a joiner until twi, and went back to being a non-joiner soon after bolting. the only time i ever even thought about it was when i had kids and wondered if they should be brought up with some identifying label. (i'd been told that kids need that sense of belonging, or some such, and that they'd feel weird if they were the only kids around without a religion.) but in the end, i realized i still agreed with the old way sentiment, "religion is the cruelest thing i know," and decided against any formal religion for my kids. and you know what? they're both great, goodhearted people (21 and 16), of strong moral and ethical character, and show no indication that being religion-free hurt them in any way. in fact, they THANK me for it.

dmiller-- i guess some of us had an easier time dropping the shackles--or maybe we're just not that self-aware! but i'm sorry to hear you still don't feel 100% "out" after 20 years. what kind of "mental bondage" are you talking about? for me, i've always been amazed at how quickly i was out mentally. in fact, i've said here before, it seemed to me like so much of my waybrain just dropped off me as soon as i stopped holding on to it. maybe you're just feeling "phantom bondage," like amputees feel phantom pain?

VF into legalism?? what a surprise! (that's a joke, sunesis--to me, he was always like a roman catholic in twi clothing. i never understood what anyone saw in him, anyway. all i ever saw was a charisma-free, IQ-challenged, no-talent jerk. but he did his best to be a clone of vp, so i guess that was all he needed. that and his comb-over.)

with all we talk about around here, i just thought it was worth bringing it up: WE GET OUT!! as bad as it all was, and as much as we all went through (and we went through an awful lot), WE SURVIVED! AND NOW WE'RE OUT!! YIPPEE!! YAHOO! HOORAAY!! CONGRATULATIONS TO US!!

i never got my corps file back! i'd love to see it--UNEDITED. for the record, i was also called into JAL's office during my first year in residence. i'd just gotten back from LEAD, and was given a scathing evaluation. john read it to me, and asked what i thought. i told him i thought it was bullsh!t, and to his credit, he tore it up, right then and there. (i'd known him for a few years in NY, pre-corps, so i'm sure that helped. but that's the kind of guy i knew him to be.) i don't remember any 3x5 cards, specifically, but the whole "reporting back to leadership" thing rings one hell of a bell. i remember confiding in a fellow corps grad (i thought we we friends! for 3 years!), and having my words spat back at me by the LC within days. nazi bastards.

i get it, dot (and you KNOW i appreciate the things you say). it's not that i don't believe in God. i just don't believe in anything or anyone that wants to tell me they've got a special connection, the inside dope--AND that what God has "told" them applies to me. i'm done done done with that. my whole thing (what there is of it) is that it's completely personal, and the minute any individual's point of view becomes dogma, we're barking up the wrong tree. and the LAST thing i'm gonna do is ignore or suppress my instincts, <_< and/or what my common sense tells me. that's how i got in trouble the last time. but that's just MY point of view, innit?? so i'd appreciate it if you'd disagree!

i know this won't be well-received, but i'm going to say it [again] anyway. bg leonard could easily be as full of sh!t as vpw. why would God speak to a 20th century man in 17th century english?? "if thou wilt..." COME ON! wake up! i'm sorry; it's asinine. it also says on his website that the KJV is the only authoritative version of the bible--are you telling me that's the best God can do? the best man God can find is dense enough to make a statement like that? puh-lease! you want to know what i think? i think they're ALL full of sh!t. it's just a matter of degree.

i have to agree, twinot. i understand that she had LIMITED options, but she really IS given a pass by many here. the fact that she was a "sweet lady" doesn't excuse her, any more than my being a "nice guy" excuses me! the truth is, many, MANY of us had to face some extremely limited options when we chose to stand against the organization we had basically given our whole lives to. many of us started over, with next to nothing to our name. didn't we? can't we understand and forgive AND hold her accountable for what she did and didn't do?

sorry i didn't respond sooner--i've been away. honestly, responses like "read a chapter of my book" smack of my pre-pfal days. i'm not terribly receptive when someone says "do this" (e.g., "take the class," "read my book") instead of just answering my question. why not just answer my question? it seems to me you should be able to answer my question in one SENTENCE. and to tell you the truth, i'm kind of turned off by the fact that you asked me to read a whole chapter--and then asked someone for write you a single-paragraph summary of bullinger's position.

just makes me feel awful for poor, young Dream Girl and her husband, headed for the corps.

a bit verbose, but i get it. so WHICH rosh hashanah?

sirguessalot: just wondering...do you learn this stuff from someone(s) somewhere, or do you just think it all up?

i think a lot of it has to do with how you choose to remember it. though what i went through in twi sometimes makes me angry, there are other times when the absurdity of it all--and my incredible stupidity--makes me laugh. even things that were unimaginably bad at the time. when i was in residence at hq, for example, there was an incident between lcm and me that dragged on for days. (years, if you count my assignment after graduation, handpicked by craigsy to show me who was boss!) it was a total nightmare going through it, probably my single worst twi experience, but now it plays like a sitcom in my head. does dwelling on the years wasted, etc., etc. do us any good? i've been there, and every so often i'll be reminded of the price i paid for postponing my life all those years. but the most miserable people i know are those who can't let go of the past. those who can't remember the good times among the bad. and life's too short to be miserable all the time. for me, even the sh!ttiest of times weren't all sh!tty. there were always bright spots. and maybe i'm just lucky that they're the times i tend to remember. so sue me! :P

waysider, THAT'S a horror story!

of course, i agree. i did it, too. too many times. but what about the fact that we're still here? does the fact that we survived all that mean anything? was it God, or just dumb luck, and lots of it?

"I was taking a quick pee outside the BRC when God spoke to me, just like I'm talking to you now. He said I should stop giving VP money until he got over his hangups about sex."

speaking of post-twi tests, very shortly after i left, i took a career aptitude test in an effort to figure out what to do with my life. at the end of the self-administered test (it was LONG--2-3 hours), it spit out a list of career possibilities. and number one on the list? a minister! i think i'd get a much different result if i took it today, because i'm sure my answers were still very way-brained. (i didn't pursue the test's recommendation, by the way.)

oldies, on the one hand, i appreciate you sticking to your guns. but on the other hand, i think you're not being honest with yourself. you've taken a position that you're not willing to reconsider, even in light of mountains of evidence to the contrary. it is, i'm afraid, EXACTLY like what we did in twi: refuse to believe the evidence of our own eyes and ears because we'd already made up our "minds" on the subject. (i put that in quotes because "made up our mind" implies thinking, when we had in fact, stopped thinking long before.) that doesn't make you a dummy. but i wouldn't say it's the smartest thing you could do, either.

i've known all the stuff in wordwolf's chronology for a long, long time. but seeing it there, all together in one place, makes me sick to my stomach. but what makes me even sicker is seeing people continue to defend the man. vpw was a liar and a thief who knowingly deceived us into believing God had taught him the word, through his own research, as it hadn't been known since the first century. HE LIED. so was it hitchhiking or carjacking? ultimately, it was much worse than a carjacking, because after stealing the car, he claimed ownership and sold it to us! over and over again.

watersedge, you should be thankful. i also had a girlfriend who got involved with twi. she most definitely chose it over me. so i decided the only way to get her out would be to really learn about it, and refute it "from within." that was in 1976, and i got sucked in, big time, for 11 years. you, my friend, dodged a major-league bullet.

that's really my point, tom. scorekeeping, i think, is what WE do. so we attribute that kind of behavior to God, too. personally, i don't think God's like that at all. those of you who have kids, are you keeping score? i know i'm not. but somehow we're supposed to believe that God works on a merit system, rather than a love system. ugh.

i thought the ending went: "...Deeds are the proof of this, not words Meet me in the motorcoach in half an hour." or am i thinking of something else?

this was inspired by a thread in "about the way," but rather than derail that thread... do you think God is keeping score? is he keeping files on every one of us, checking off "naughty" and "nice" boxes like santa claus? and what's his standard, the "Word of God" that none of us can seem to agree on? how can we be held accountable to a "standard" like that? i don't know, i'd like to think God has better things to do than tally up our hits and misses. seems to me the whole scorekeeping thing is strictly a human preoccupation. what do YOU think?

what DIDN'T he rip off? (i guess he had to be pretty well-read to be such a plagiarist, huh?) was the corps program a lift? it couldn't have been from that lininger guy at pikes peak, could it? what about the corps principles? at this point, it's hard to believe he said anything original.

exactly, skyrider! man, i hadn't thought of that "poem" in forever: "where dull denominations rule with heavy hand." HA! that's just what it became. amazing. maybe peepee was a prophet--foretelling his own cult's demise!