Twinky

No Shiftthis, you haven't. What I asked was this: You have set yourself up as a mouthpiece for The Way. But you comment on what your own approach would be. Should it be taken, then, that your approach is exactly what The Way's attitude would be? You say: You would therefore refuse to have anything to do with them; refuse to fellowship with them; refuse to help them. Refuse to show them the love of God. The Way's attitude to homosexuals (under LCM's reign of terror) was that they were the lowest of the low, dregs of society, basically words weren't enough to describe their despicable behavior. Who does God love? Does he not pour out his goodness on all? Is not God's love unconditional? Who did Jesus hang around with? Drunkards, prostitutes, the lowest of the low, dregs of society, those nobody else wanted to be around. Wouldn't surprise me at all if some of those were homosexual, even though there was an enormous taboo against that in Jewish society. (The very fact that it is mentioned at all means that it was present in that society!) No, Jesus showed love, grace, compassion. He wasn't judgmental, condemnatory; he showed he cared. Some people listened, changed their ways; others didn't. Change doesn't happen from simply reading words in a book - maybe only reading those words once or twice, even if it does say Bible on the cover; it takes time to sink in and for the desire to change one's behavior (whatever that behavior is) to something more Godly. It takes a proper model. Once full of grace and kindness. Another question for you: What about what The Way might consider lesser sins? Does the Way now kick out adulterers? Child molesters? What about those men who do not love their wives as themselves, but abuse them, hit them, emotionally injure them? What about "invisible" sins? Those who are prideful? Those who lie? Those who think ill of their brothers in Christ? Those who backbite and speak evil of fellow Christians? And those who condone these things, even if they (say they) haven't done them themselves? Because, Shiftthis, all those things are ALSO in the Word, and there are most definitely people still fellowshipping with The Way who do (some of) those things. There may even be some who have done all of these things. Where does the kicking out start? And finish? How on earth would you "help them," without first showing that you cared enough to help them? Otherwise, it's just finger-wagging from a position of superiority. How on earth does The Way "help" anyone, when it doesn't show it cares?

Oh hello Dooj, you're back from being banned then? Welcome back to the Cafe.

I knew this would draw a lot of replies quickly, but I would really like to hear from Shiftthis. Shiftthis, how can you answer these people? And can you please answer the question I posed in the first post? (Everyone else, give him a chance to reply, please)

Shiftthis posted a number of quotes recently. These are some extracts (edited a little to correct some spelling bloopers): Shiftthis is at pains to emphasise how much TWI has changed since Martindale was kicked out. Others describe it as being "softer and kinder." No doubt there has been change - some perhaps for the better. I just have one question, specifically for Shiftthis: what is the Way's attitude towards homosexuals? If a homosexual man (or woman) turned up looking very "gay", would that person be welcomed, honestly and openly, at a Sunday Night Service? Or (even if permitted to stay) would they remain feeling welcome, or would they feel lectured at, and condemned for their sexuality? It is widely understood at the Cafe that Rosalie and Donna have had/are in a relationship and there have been allegations that Rosalie had a lesbian couple living (secretly) in her household. Those things have always been kept away from the wider public knowledge, even from most people living at HQ. And certainly at the time, that behavior was going on even though it didn't fit with Martindale's rages against it. But now? If, let's say, two homosexual ex-Wayfers (perhaps some of those you say were "wrongly thown outa the ministry by others who aint here no more" turned up hand-in-hand for SNS, what would be the reaction?

Do these last few posts need to be a separate thread?

Interesting it that seems more people are incensed about that email than Shellon herself is. As far as TWI is concerned, she sees through their manipulative and mean-spirited approach and has of necessity grown a thick hide to withstand it. Perhaps the rest of us haven't had to put up with quite that level of abuse in that particular area and that's why we're so angry about the email. It's double-edged abuse. A form of self-abuse. The fact is that the writer probably sincerely meant what she said. Sincere, but diametrically opposed to Godliness.

"Punishment assignments" didn't start after graduation; they were an integral part of the in reez WC training. You need to learn humility. Go directly to the Dishroom. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200. You cannot use your Community Chest "Get out of Jail Dishroom Free" card. (If you are female and have a chest, you can use it for other benefits.)

Shell, your story is brave and inspirational. It would be sad if you feel unable to share it because I'm sure what you have said has helped others to realize "it's not just them" and what has happened to them is part of a pattern. Stories like yours, and those of other women here at the Cafe, have been immensely healing to me in understanding what was done to me. But what you share should never be at the expense of your loved ones. Those real live flesh and blood women are more important than your cyber-friends. I know you'll do whatever is right to protect them. (((((Shell)))))

Come back to TWi, you make such a good punchbag, we can really give you a good kicking then. Oh, and if your daughter doesn't get the benefit of healing, it's still your fault and we will kick you some more for that. .....Yeah, right...... All the best for you and both your daughters, Shell.

(((((Shell))))) What mstar1 said...doubled. What unbelievable hatred that person has. Hey, sad ones that feel the need to write such notes: and this:

True, those things are very bad. Especially the loss of lots of very influential leadership in Poland. I would, however, like to point to some truly excellent news, and some, Jim, that you should appreciate....the rescue of many coal miners in China after being trapped in a flooded mine. Survived 9 or 10 days at least, by eating bits of wood from the pit props and drinking the dirty flood water...but they have survived.

No Easter eggs for you, then, Composer, nor "Good" Friday and Easter Monday as statutory holidays. Nor 25 Dec, and no Chrissie pressies. (LOL) Enjoy your life while it lasts. Maybe you'd like to start a thread about what you use for rules for life. Those rules don't seem to include graciousness. Everybody else: went to the second service at my church. It was an all-age service (kids didn't go out). People were asked to get into little groups with people sitting nearby. We were asked how we learned: by copying. We were asked to write down a few things that we thought Jesus would be like. One of the kids wrote, "Like my Dad." That got a round of applause. That little lad copied his Dad, who was copying (one hopes) Jesus, who copied his Dad - God.

RumRunner, I can agree with you that there are probably many good priests, nuns, and other religious people connected with the RC church. As in all other churches. Unfortunately the ones who misbehave tend to do so spectacularly. Other church hierarchy is probably even worse, in knowing about the evil acts, covering up, not doing anything constructive about it and thus condoning and permitting the behavior to continue. Thus permitting other [young people] to be abused as well. Not just in the RC church either; probably happens to some extent in every type of group, Christian or non-Christian, though I can't of course speak for Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists. But how are incidents dealt with, when they occur? What is the means of recourse? Yes, Rummie, I'd agree that there are some great right-believing and right-acting people out there whose good works are largely unsung. And Composer: Funny, and yeah, you do kinda wonder what connection they might have, that would "wink" at the cover-up.

I think all that stuff about David with his not-so-subtle comparison was simply a part of VPW's self-aggrandisement. He wanted to put himself right up there with David. Okay, David messed up with Bathsheba. He also messed up (though not shown in the extracts from the Bible that WW selected, above) over not dealing with his sons Amnon when one of them followed his example and raped - raped his own sister Tamar (2 Sam 13). That caused chaos and civil war in the kingdom. The fearless young David, who hunted down the enemies of Israel, in turn became hunted down and fled in fear of his own son (2 Sam 15:14ff). Abandoned his women folk. Not so perfect really, then. The younger David was generous and giving - a protector to the weak. When older and richer (and once he was the Top Man), he also prepared ahead. He collected materials for a magnificent temple. He gave of his own money for the temple. He set up contracts with neighboring potentates for the supply of beautiful things for the temple (exotic woods, etc). You might say Weirwille also prepared ahead - managed to get that auditorium built - put some donation in of his own funds. It is a nice place. But for the glory of God - or the glory of Weirwille? The older David was an old lecher who had a young woman, Abishag, to warm his bed (1 Kgs 1). The older Wierwille ... well, fill in the blanks for yourself. Perhaps Wierwille was telling us more than we realized........

So (on now having looked at the document included by James Trimm) here we have an alleged plagiarizer (James T) defending a claim from another *known* plagiarizer (TWI). Are we being asked to adjudicate? To take sides? Even VPW in PFAL makes the point that a translation is one thing, a "version" is another, when people start to work on the rough draft of a translation and sort out nuances. (And that's before you get into "literals according to usage.") Any translation, version, has an element of doctrine attached to it. The choice made to use one word instead of another to express nuances in the original language is partly translation, partly doctrine - even sometimes for quite everyday objects - never mind amorphous concepts like love, joy, peace, gentleness, goodness, longsuffering etc which you will recognise from Galatians 5 - but the words aren't the same in every version of the Bible and sometimes one word is used to represent another. Very loving, though, the way TWI goes after smaller groups to pick them off.

I'm sure this is covered in all classes run by this organization, and has been fully canvassed in Corps meetings...not. If what you report is accurate, not a whisper of that will have reached the ears of any innie at lower level. Maybe the BoT has discussed it. Sounds like some lawyers' ruse, actually.

An active w/e in the garden... Nothing on Fri. Sat rained most of the day...bought a rake (my birthday presssie!!) and checked out prices of sand and cement. Sun afternoon we re-layed the upper part of the path. That's probably right, now. I uplifted some baby leeks and some dismal purple sprouting broccoli which were likely to get squashed by the uplifted pavers. Today friend assaulted the lower path which has some steps that are steep and appear to be some sort remnant staircase. He has spent nearly all day hacking out an area about 3' square and 6" deep. Ideally the staircase needs reducing some more...the hire shop has equipment which will be enjoying a trip to my garden (!). Like most tasks, this fairly simple path re-laying is turning into a major exercise. So while he was chiselling out the breeze blocks and old cement...I turned my compost heap and pulled up some beginning weeds. Much more enjoyable. The soil is lovely - the cold in the winter has done good. It's rather a pity that all along the path, the rubble from under the path is piled up, including scraping off some of the clay bed. Just when the garden looked like it was going to flourish, this year.

Lots of little ones is good. It's when they stop that the worrying starts...what's building up somewhere? Which was 7.2? That's fairly fearsome.

The original thread topic: There has been talk in other threads about the seeds for faulty doctrines having been sown in PFAL. And the seed for this doctrine was also sown there. "No friends when it comes to the Word." And later (though not in PFAL) pointing to the gospels where it talks about opposition between family members (eg Mt 10:35; Lk 12.53). As if people are discardable - family in particular. You'd think a genuinely Christian ministry would work hard with both individuals to help them reconcile differences - pointing out (lovingly) how either or both could improve. Instead of which, we got arrogant bossiness saying men should lord it over their wives, and women (whether wives or not) should submit to any male in "authority" - whether the man was right or wrong - because God spoke to the man and how did you (a mere woman) know he wasn't acting by revelation? So yes - it was deliberate, to get rid of anyone who didn't "submit" (male or female) to their doctrines. Culling the strong, you might say.

I think I heard someplace that the silo that housed the lift in the Auditorium was a missile silo. But I musta got that from within TWI when they said that people on the outside had said... So I don't know if people on the outside actually did say that, or if TWI was just saying that to laugh at outsiders.

I do know of cases where a break-up was "engineered" - then one would be banished and the other invited to stay. Then they would try to get the one who remained into another relationship with some other pliant believer. The banished one probably hadn't (in reality) done a thing wrong except perhaps retain some shred of his or her own ability to think and to challenge TWI on some of its practices (or just ignore some of the practices) - thus showing they weren't fully committed. If any of 'em had a single skill in the matrimonial counselling area, I'd be amazed. All they did was encourage and endorse dominance/doormat relationships.

Happy Easter to you too, Dot! "New every morning is the love "Our wakening and uprising prove; "Through sleep and darkness safely brought, "Restored to life and power and thought." New Every Morning - tune

Leafy, feel free to come over here with a very large water butt. Will give you surplus stocks of water free.

Ham, tell us more about these. What were the miracles, please describe. And who forbade you to put the name of da way on them, the beneficiary of the miracles - or TWI for some odd reason? (Not like them to pass up an opportunity for God self-promotion.) Maybe you could start a separate thread.

Rise and Expansion... :( LCM used to say that authors shouldn't write until they had something worth saying; a lot of books were written because of the ego of the authors. This was his reason for not writing anything before R&E. (He seems to have forgotten at the time the number of books published under VPW's name. Or perhaps he thought he didn't know as much as VPW.) But R&E was important now as we moved into the Decade of the Whatever Word (I dunno the sequence of the "Decades" now, nor do I care to try to remember.) Interesting that he should write R&E right after a mass exodus of people after the Loy-alty letter. A sort of oxymoron, perhaps. Also, with the internet being more widely accessible, it would be easier to spot plagiarism and he had enough other litigatable things that needed to be covered up, without covering up any plagiarism.