chockfull

Yeah, really. Only in cult-land brainwash-ville does making something of your life like that and genuinely helping others with a career equate "looney". And you know, honestly to see people fight to overcome things like her story which date all the way back to their childhood is really inspiring. She escaped TWI with a brain, education, a great husband unlike the low-class guy that summarizes her life as "looney". Her ex sounds like he's in the "L"'s himself. L-L-L-Loser!!!!

This is the modus operendi of TWI. Find weakness. Prey upon it screwing up the person's life. Blame them for having a screwed up life. You see that in kris's book with VP talking about a devil spirit talking and telling kris she's possessed all the while planning and carrying out adultery. VP was the one possessed, not kris. Look at the fruit of what he did with her, you. They take any little sign of weakness and blame the victim. Even if they don't see weakness they still will make up lies about people and blame them. And they look for scapegoats in any bad situation - someone who is there and they don't like that they can pin everything on. God will judge them. He will stand up for the weak. That's part of my hope when Jesus Christ returns.

The main problem with this is what they mean by "The Word". What they mean is that which is defined by the BOD. For example, on the topic of "debt" w/r to the BOD's policies. Many people have submitted research on this topic to help them get to what the Word says about it. However, the BOD's response to the Word shared and researched is not to discipline themselves to it, but to say "we're not looking at that topic right now", and then to bring retribution against those who dared to present the Word to them. This, of course, is the same pattern taken currently as has been taken in the past with the "adultery" topic and research. This is not out of date. So in reality, that phrase if you're talking about the truth of the matter, should read something like the following: "The Way Ministry is designed by a few power-mongering politicians for people who highly value absolute compliance to authority. Any resemblence of "the Word" that you come across in TWI will certainly not be from their Biblical Research department, which is non-existent, nor from the work of anyone educated in Biblical research. It will be largely plagiarized from the founder's contemporaries and dumbed down to a middle school reading level. Not all people want that so we are a 'unique' group with 'unique service offerings', with the understanding that the word 'unique' means 'dwindling'."

Jeremiah 13:23 Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? then may ye also do good, that are accustomed to do evil. The leaders in TWI haven't changed. But it's a nice sounding lie that they are promoting.

I'm sure to plan the adversary out of their life and save on expenses they'd book one bunk instead of two.

I think if I rated people in order from top to bottom as to who I would want to go on a cruise with, that group would probably rank down there as the people I'd least want to go on a cruise with. None of them cared about us when we were in the org - nobody kept in touch then, why would I want to now?

There's quite a difference between filling out a schedule as a homework assignment and doing one every week for years with an hour scheduled as discussion time for someone to go over it with you.

I do get a kick out of it. This is what those in math would call a shell game with the commutative law of equality.

I remember a great conversation I had with a devout chan buddhist about suffering. He was expounding on the reason for suffering, which he said they believe is attachment to things, to unrealistic expectations, ideas, emotions. Their path to overcoming suffering is to recognize and live higher than these types of attachments. He had great respect for my Christianity. He said buddhism didn't teach you about God or Jesus, but about yourself. I can see value in his teachings and belifs

geisha, It's OK. I forgive you. I get heated too regarding TWI injustices. -cf

Well, geisha, in all actuality in spite of all your condescending statements here, my view is that learning my faith is a lifelong endeavor. And how about you? Second, what exactly is an "actual anointed Pastor"? Because for many years I believed that about myself. And I have found what I would consider that inside and outside TWI. So what do you believe about what is termed the "gift ministries"? Since there seems to be a bit of controversy over the term fundamentalist, and some emotional reaction to me stating that I am "moving away from fundamentalist views", I thought I'd go look it up. Oh, and here's a suggestion - instead of the extreme emotional reaction and debate that you started from my statement, why don't you just ask me what I mean by that statement? I'm pretty sure that it's radically different that what you assume I mean. From what I can gather researching the term "Fundamentalism", it certainly is a 20th century term. It seems to have arisen within the Presbyterian church over issues of tolerance between liberal and conservative viewpoints. It also is a general term. It can describe a faction of the Muslim faith for instance. And it can describe politics, as in the term "right wing / left wing fundamentalist". It's not a huge leap of logic to put together that pretty much all of us on this site have certain struggles attached to formerly being in a bible cult. There also are varying degrees of involvement and commitment to that cult we've experienced. I have no viewpoint that God is so vast there is no way to know Him. My whole statement about "moving away from a fundamentalist viewpoint" is simply moving away from an elitist condescending "I have the only version of truth" attitude so prevalent in the Christianity of TWI and many other groups. I see fundamentalists of many categories that puff themselves up with knowledge, assume things about their brethren, and act in a condescending fashion. I see that condescencion in your responses to me. And I think it is not Christian fruit. I am trying to move away from that in my life. Maybe more accurately I should state that I'm not moving away from the fundamentals of the Christian faith, I am moving away from Fundamentalists. Because I had enough lectures for a lifetime while in TWI. No need for more.

That's because it was coined by RFR. When she found out LCM had a harem, she made him turn in a schedule and controlled his time so he didn't have access to it.

So are you now labeling people who stand against fundamentalists? Hey, I'll take a stand and say that people holding a restricted, narrow view of God are wrong. God is vast!!! He is the Creator of the universe!!! When people start defining narrow views of Him, they try to bring Him down to their level, which is narrow-minded. God is not an idol to dumb down to your level so you can control Him. Even if they try to justify it through scriptures, it doesn't work. They make themselves fools. All it means is that thier interpretation of scriptures is as narrow-minded as their viewpoint. And that leads to making up religions. And leads to appointing people as intercessors for God. And that leads to heads of religion. And that leads to the abuse of the common people, just like you see in TWI. And it's a fallacy of logic that if you tell someone they are wrong it assumes you know what is right. It negates the scientific method. It negates common sense. It negates rational logic. You prove something wrong - then you know it's wrong, even if you don't know what's right at that point. What is this message? All I'm hearing is that criticizing fundamentalists is wrong. That's no message, it's a misguided opinion. And you are tremendously reading into the fact they are being criticized for putting their faith in Jesus Christ Christ as the only Savior. They are being criticized for putting their Savior in a box. And yes they have names, faces, lives. And yes they still can be deluded and wrong in spite of that. Most of the people I've met like that would definitely not give me the shirt off thier back or dollars. They are takers, and anything they give you is a bribe for you supporting their delusions. For example, a great deal of people currently in TWI. They are of this type. I've seen their fruit. So don't try to snow me that their fruit is heavenly and blessed by the Savior.

My question is does teaching that sickness is death in part or whole lead people towards expecting to die when they're really sick? I personally think that sickness and death are two completely unrelated topics, other than the fact that you can have a terminal disease.

Blood drive outside the lair of the vampires. Oh the ironing.

I don't know. I'm absolutely a Christian. Just not a big fan of the Crusades, and not looking to duplicate that effort in this century. ;)

Well I was making a strong statement. Of course in doing that, the label of "fundamantalist" that I intended to indicate the type of thinking I described later in that sentence can wrongly be assumed to be applied towards many forward thinking individuals whose views might be seen in that realm. For example, CS Lewis. Now, I really don't think he's the type of person I was talking about. But anytime you generalize or apply a label there is the danger of it being misunderstood. In the later part of this sentence, are you really trying to say that without a fundamentalist outlook you can't apply rational thought to a subject? Or that's required to apply rational thought with a predicate? That sounds like quite a reach. You're coming after me pretty hard in your response. I think perhaps you're taking personally my statements due to my statement of moving away from fundamentalist viewpoints and your consideration of yourself as fundamentalist. However, I'm more targeted the narrow-minded, obedience instead of free thinking viewpoint of the type I saw in TWI than I am targeting the more general meaning of the term. I personally would love to sit down with CS Lewis over a cup of coffee and conversation.

During a couple of my college classes we would study literary works written in another language. It's amazing how you can get the content, but none of the nuances came through - imagery, figures, emotions, character development. I'm really moving away from the fundamentalist viewpoint. Once people start to get all narrow on a definition they think is "the Word" most of the time I've seen they just start acting like bigoted rednecks who think they are intellectual but in reality are stupid.

Yeah. We gave up a lot. I didn't need to be treated like royal caste. In fact in most cases I would have settled for mutual respect, which seldom happened. People over me were harsh / abusive. People in our fellowships were unhappy, complaining, wanting someone to tell them what to do. When we'd just teach and expect them to run their own lives they'd complain. And they all knew better than us. It's amazing how much lecturing I'd take from all sides. The lecturing of the people was on how the ministry was supposed to be, which I had zero input on as it's run autocratically. The lecturing of our leaders was on "moving the Word". We never had time for normal stuff like jobs, family. It was largely all volunteer effort. Nobody anywhere ever thanked us. Nobody cared. I started to see that people around us - neighbors, co-workers, Christians in the community all acted a h3ll of a lot more Chistian towardd us than people in the ministry. The fruit of people started to show for what is was - a coerced bribery. Bondage. Slavery to traditions, positions. Lack of Word lived. Now I can find more Christian fruit on the block I live on than I saw in the last 5 years I was in TWI. You see the Corps ceased to be "It Is Written", and drifted towards "It Is Position". Who said something was infinitely more important than the truth of what was said. People stopped quoting chapter and verse, and instead quoted "so and so said". Maybe it was always that way, or maybe it changed. Either way the cruelty of religion and politics always brings out the worst in humanity. I met good and bad. And there were those that were good or bad to me but different to others. I never needed anyone doing much of anything for me. But it's amazing how much of an attitude we'd see when we'd have expectations that if people are using our home for their church they leave it like they found it. People would trash our home, break our stuff, steal our stuff, lie about it. We'd just eat it all the time because what are you going to do? People would blame us for stuff other leaders did to them we didn't know about. Of course in addition to working a job and volunteering a second job I needed to be omniscient too. It's just a system that uses people. If people are paying $$$ every month they deserve to have the utilization of a church. Not send all the money in to have some fat cats on a farm acting like hot shots. There is very little value add there. Was the Corps divisive? Sure. There are no degrees of saved or ranks in the body of Christ. But I didn't go in for that. I went in to take my commitment to God to a new level. To serve more. To help more people. But with the hierarchy and the system in place, it uses people. People serve the system. And that happens regardless of any one individual's motivation. It's like Paul said of the legalists in Jerusalem - "they seemed to be somewhat, but they added nothing to me". We're all equal in God's eyes. F the labels.

We could always call it CFRJ ministries. "Can't find a real job" ministries.

I think you're on to something there. There have been quite a few TWI leaders of questionable mental health I've run into. Obsessive / compulsive, anger issues, bipolar, compulsive liars. And all of these with a "rev" title. At the very top now you have a black widow spider that would eat her own young.

Exxxxaaaaaccccttllyy!!!!!! And where exactly do I read about Jesus leadership abilities requiring schedules planned in 15 minutes slots of the 12 disciples later called apostles? Like if Jesus could have helped the 12 with a better plan, like Judas, then Judas never would have failed like he did. Jesus just wasn't quite up to par as a TWI leader. Ex: Judas schedule 5-6am Rise up a great while before day 6-6:15am Depart to a solitary place 6:15-7am Pray 7-8am Temple 8-10am Office Hours 10-11 Witnessing 11-12 Lunch 12-1 CP3 - exercise 1-1:30pm - steal money from the common fund bag 1:30-3pm - Office hours 3-3:30pm - Meet with Roman leadership to betray Jesus 3:30-5pm - Meeting prep 5-6pm - Dinner 6pm - 7 Household chores 7pm - 8pm Fantasize about women 8pm - sleep See - if Judas would just work on what he's spending time on in the 1-1:30pm, 3-3:30pm and 7pm slots, he could plan the adversary out of his life. Oh, and if Jesus was really a great leader, he would have noticed this in Judas's schedule, or some kind of discrepancy so that he could have helped Judas earlier. Jesus could have planned the adversary out of his life better too.

Planning the adversary out of your life is an incredibly egotistical elitist type of statement from deluded Christians. It's representative of the ego and elitism wrapped up in TWI.

penworks, this reminds me of a gift in a similar capacity i was involved with. looking back the fanboy surrealistic enthusiasm i carried then towards a project of this nature now makes me want to vomit!!!!

In TWIspeak, they always come up with something. Decade of Prevailing, etc. I mean you have 6 people sitting around a table at a BOD meeting, tasked with doing nothing but this. No responsibility outside of the theme for the decade, the year, and the teaching calendar. I'm sure they can dream up something, however delusional. You know, with all the lesson plan requirements, they ought to hire a schoolteacher to run it. They're used to filling out yearly plans. Oh, wait. They already did. :o