Broken Arrow

Perhaps he has (or had) a patron.

Umm...is the snake also missing?

I don't know, but I will say that waking prisoners up in the middle of the night with a "bang" was a brain-washing technique used by the North Koreans. At least that's what I was taught in Principles of Democracy class in high school. I heard the same thing taught by John Somerville when I was College Division when the 6th Corps was in residence. LCM was at that same meeting. I'm not drawing any hard and fast conclusions here. Still, maybe there's a correlation. Then again, maybe not. I mentioned the high school class thing to give it more credibility.

I'm only guessing here...but I'm thinking you must be the type of person people feel for whatever reason comfortable telling you their struggles. The real shame is that TWI "short-armed" you at a time where you may have been in a position to offer some compassion and understanding. Good thing you're out.

I think she took a job with the government.

Never mind.

You know what's even more stupid? And I was waiting for this to happen. The word "Christmas" was supposed to be bad because VPW said it derived from "Christ-Mass", or a "Mass for Christ". VPW said "Christ-Mass" was a funeral so we were supposed to say, "Happy Household Holiday". The word "Holiday" comes from middle english meaning "Holy Day". The Bible says we are not to esteem any day "holier than another". Therefore "Happy Household Holiday" was every bit as pagan as the word, "Christmas". Actually, someone else whose name I can't remember came up with this. For years I waited for this bit of enlightenment to dawn on our leadership, but it never did, at least to where that, too, was changed. It was all about ego and shoving things down people's throats. I thought it was stupid then and I went along with it because that's pretty much how I handled things back then.

Yeah, I vote for stupid. He should have been thankful there was even a group of musicians who would play, and it would not have been out of line for him to, um, let's see, uh...oh! Ask Nicely? But to issue an order and then get po'd because you wouldn't comply? Nah! He was just looking for a moment to "act spiritual".

Oh, they're still around. You just can't find 'em in the places you mentioned (Internet, TV etc.) They're out actually doing things for people and it ain't signing folks up for a class, or trying to impress others with their great intellectual knowledge of whatever. But you're right, a lot of poo-poo is being shared as well.

Never mind.

You mean you like, completely forgot to show up? Now that would be cool.

I figured if I got caught using more than my "fair share", then hats off to whoever the person was who caught me. Furthermore, it was shared that toilet paper was not for runny noses. If you had a cold and you used toilet paper to take care of a runny nose, then it was stealing. Yup! Biblical Research at its finest!

Those are the areas around HQ, right? Hmmm...I thought their presence was supposed to provide a blessing for the rest of the area. Oh well, guess not.

never mind.

It all just fits like a foot fits in a mouth.

Man! That's almost as good as the song "We Didn't Start the Fire" from Billy Joel!

Just so I'm clear, are you saying one shouldn't reject fundamentalism based solely on an experience in TWI?

And now for my 2-cents. My recollection is that it was called, "The Victor Paul Wierwille Word Over the World Auditorium. I think it was at Living Victoriously (1982) when the BOT with Wierwille as President announced that VP had asked them not to name it after him until after his death. The BOT still named it after him but agreed not to actually call it "The Victor Paul Wierwille...etc." until after his death. He died shortly after the official opening so most of us remember it carrying his name.

Then he stood in front of the entire Rock of Ages and cried about how his "heart ached" and basically said we had let him down. At least that's the way I remember it. But that's another topic.

You know...it just dawned on me that "Weed Coordinator" can have a whole different meaning depending on one's perspective. I'll take the job!!

Excuse me...do you mean there's just "one" weed on the right, or that everything on the right is a weed? Also, when you say "pull", I think I saw someone actually "yank"...is that okay? I don't want to get yelled at during mealtime announcements. Maybe we need a "Weed Coordinator".

Yeah but that was pretty hard to do. There was a lot of pressure to do something like go WOW or take the ADV Class, go to some event etc. Some people did it but they were looked down on and considered "fringe believers".

I think there is some truth in saying that I cannot rightfully claim I would have been better off without TWI. Certainly I must take responsibility for my own behavior and there must have been something about The Way International that was attractive to me or I would not have stayed for 15 years. There certainly were a lot of people who were not lured in and there was ample opportunity for me to see what was really going on. Moreover other people were able to leave, why didn't I? I did plenty of my own self promotion while I was in and probably would have found another venue to live out my own brokeness. Perhaps it would have been something much worse like drug addiction. Therein lies the rub. I would have been better off if I had been different or if I had been willing to face my own vices. Ultimately that is what it came to for me. I had to face the fact that I personally had some pretty dark issues of my own. It took the loss of my marriage to wake up to that. Was I ready to face my own demons at the age of 17 when I first associated with TWI? Maybe, but I certainly wasn't willing.

I don't remember the thing about not abbreviating The WOW Auditorium. I don't remember Way Prod. singing a song about it either. I do remember when they were building it and it was around the same time TWI decided to start recording things on Beta. I remember being on the field in a state far removed from Ohio when we heard that the first thing TWI was going to put on BETA for us was the Word Over the World Auditorium updates. I mean, they really made a big deal out of this as if putting those updates on Beta was such a treat for those of us on the field. One of my Corps brothers sarcastically uttered, "Oh, thank God!" Anyway, it was one of my first inklings that HQ was living in a world all its own.

Hey...is that on display somewhere in the WOW Auditorium?