WordWolf

That second verse is obvious, especially when it's posted in its entirety. "SWEET HOME ALABAMA", the Allman Brothers.

He may have been a nice man to you, but he threatened me once and tried to intimidate me. I had asked him something. He lied to my face. I asked if he minded if I checked into what he said. He replied by threatening me with physical harm if I did. He was big, but he wasn't fast, nor did he move like a trained fighter. I was NOT intimidated by him. I let my body language show it in spades at that point, and doubled down the more he talked. Frankly, he was increasingly bothered by how I didn't flinch or back down- which made it more fun for me to increasingly show calmness and confidence while he kept trying. For the record, I was faster than him, and a trained fighter, and I already had a plan mapped out if he tried to jump at me. I wasn't just pretending he wasn't a viable threat to me. I'm not of the opinion he was like that before he went to live on-grounds in the corps. I think he degenerated a lot in his first year in residence- since I'd met him before that and that's why we were even HAVING a conversation. Maybe it was because I was another guy, and maybe because he thought he could intimidate me because he was taller than me. Looking back, whenever someone on-grounds said something and tried to one-up me (for the few times I was there, it happened quite a bit), I kept letting it all roll off my back. It looked to me like those came from insecurity and not from a legit concern for me, so I gave it the attention it deserved. I was quite shocked when I'd heard about his death. Frankly, I thought he might have earned a smack-down or a thrashing, but I certainly didn't think he'd earned an early grave. Then again, by deciding to try to blend in on grounds, and cementing his blind loyalty when lcm demanded oaths of blind loyalty in 88-89, he'd begun to set the stage for what actually killed him. Was it his loyalty to lcm, or his loyalty to twi that really set the stage? Perhaps it was both- so when lcm took his wife and it turned out he could do nothing about it (he tried to get her to leave with him, they talked her into staying), he blew his brains out after yelling at her that he couldn't compete with lcm. Why he didn't just shoot lcm instead, I think, goes back to his blind loyalties. He decided previously that he'd go off a cliff for lcm/twi, so, when the option came, that's what he did. And, yes, they told his widow that he would have killed her and himself if she'd left the grounds with him. Yes, that was a vicious lie.

I used to trust the people who introduced me to pfal, and made it sound like they were all great people entirely because of pfal. That was the same bait-and-switch that had been practiced when the hippies had gone out. vpw sent out quality Christians as his advertising arm, and made it look like what made them quality Christians was the pfal class, when they'd been quality long before hearing of it. So, for year after year, quality Christians in twi convinced people that they key to being a quality Christian was pfal and whatever vpw was teaching. I think they had no real idea how they were deceiving everyone, since it had been done to them and it was such an omnipresent practice that it was the status quo. So, because I trusted them, I trusted wierwille- to a point, and lcm- to a lesser point.

I started this thread in "About the Way", and that was not because I wanted to do a historical exegesis of a High Church practice. As it is, in the RCC, the standing is for the Mass, and not for anything else. If you encounter a priest, deacon, or higher-up in any context other than a Mass or a formal ceremony, things are actually pretty CASUAL. In fact, if they're not wearing a clerical collar or other symbol, it's possible to not realize you're interacting with a priest. They also don't require standing when they hold Bible classes.

To say nothing of the tendency in twi for "leadership" to slap the adjective "spiritual" to anything- as if it changed the properties. vpw himself said that, if you took a jar of pickles, and changed the label to "apple butter", that didn't change the pickles on the inside. However, that's exactly what he did. lcm did the same- thus, he'd freak out about something, yell about it at length, then, when he was in control of himself again, announce that the preceding tantrum was actually "spiritual anger"- thus, not a tantrum at all. I'm forgetting a lot of the more common examples. I do remember that- in the late 80s- I'd gotten so tired of the "spiritual noun" business that I started to make fun of it. I ran into another college-age person at an ROA who seemed to be in a good mood. I said he looked like he'd had "a spiritual bl**j**." He cracked up at that, more to the nerve it took to make that joke than anything else, I suspect. It's coming back to me how much "spiritual whatever" was in twi. For a time, that seemed like a piece of any long discussion. "Where's he going to fit that phrase in his teaching?" Not a very long time for me, but then I was out of twi shortly after that, so if they kept it up for the next decade, it's not like I would have known.

So, you're saying that Mr "I hate Roman Catholicism so much that I ranted if my original congregation even had a Christmas tree in their house", Mr "Let's Put an anti-Roman Catholic book in the twi bookstore" turned around and copied the Roman Catholic Church to get people to stand when he entered the room?

No, and you missed a clue.

That's him. He's been in a lot of stuff, and none of that was what he's best remembered for at all.

That last line sounds familiar, but I'm not getting the song from it.

How about "QUANTUM LEAP"???

He was a spaceship commander and I thought he might have been considered a federal agent. In retrospect, that last part doesn't apply.

Everything useful on the topic's already been said! :) It was vague so twi could make it mean whatever they wanted, to get people to do whatever twi wanted them to do, which was usually to promote twi, run classes, etc.

1."Hello, and welcome to "TV Car Trivia!" First question, who was the driver of a '73 Firebird? Uh, Otto?" 2."Uh, Jim Rockford, "Rockford Files"." 3."Gimme "Columbo"." 4."A Peugeot convertible." 1."What color?" 4."Gray." 5."How do you know that?" 4."'Cause I love that show." 5."Man, I got three words for all of y'all: Get a life!" 6."What's on Magnum P.I.'s license plate?" 7."ROBIN-1" 4."Wait, wasn't Robin that faggoty guy that always hung with him?" 8."Naw, that was Higgins. That was Higgins." 2."Hey, hey, ten points for our fearless leader. Sway, how about giving us the Bill Bixby trifecta?" 3."Drove a Corvette in "The Magician", a Ford pickup truck in "The Incredible Hulk", and in "The Courtship of Eddie's Father", he walked. " This remake did well enough in the box office, but I can't help think part of that was due to the advertising. One supporting character was made to look like a main character with most of the screen-time. This is one of the appearances in media of the "coroner with an iron stomach" type of thing. When one character answers the phone, he's at work in a crematorium. He puts down his sandwich- on the corpse- to answer the phone. "If his unpleasant wounding has in some way enlightened the rest of you as to the grim finish beneath the glossy veneer of criminal life, then his injuries carry with it an inherent nobility, and a supreme glory. We should all be so fortunate. You say 'poor Toby'? I say 'poor us'. " Cast includes Delroy Lindo, Christopher Eccleston, Giovanni Ribisi, Arye Gross. "Well, without disappointment, you cannot appreciate victory." "Did Eleanor tell you that?" "Well that's hitting below the belt." " One: You kill me, they kill you, your brother dies anyway. Two: You lie, you accept the job, you take your brother, you run. I hunt you down, I kill you, I kill your brother and I kill your mother for the aggravation you cause me. Three: You accept the job, you steal some cars, you make some money, and you be a big brother."

Dr Fu Manchu Grigori Rasputin Mycroft Holmes Jonathan Blair Bernard Day Chris Lewis Sir Felix Raybourne Georges Seurat Harry Cooper Lt Cdr Dick Raikes, RN Karaga Pasha John Preston Franz Vermes Gil Rossi Charles Highbury Marquis St. Evremonde Sir Henry Baskerville Dr. Pierre Gerard Prof. Alan Driscoll Paul Allen Capt. Wolfgang von Kleinschmidt Mephistoles Count Ludwig Karnstein Prof. Karl Meister Franklyn Marsh Sir Matthew Phillips Philippe Darvas Godfrey Hanson Lord George Jeffreys John Reid Col. Charles Bingham James Hildern Sir Alexander Saxton Lord Summerisle Dr. Stephen Hayward Martin Wallace

No, not a comedian.

I'll give you another minute, then I'll post more clues or something.

Well, a man's house is his castle...is it "CASTLE?" What else was Nathan Fillon in? I think there was a cop show.... "The Rookie?"

It was TheEvan. 1/17/2005. On page 3 of the thread, "Craig and VP's relationship." "Back to Leonard. Being cataloger of old photos and such, surely you are familiar with the photos of Wierwille's first two "PFAL" classes? Well, most everybody was, as they were published often enough. Did you ever see the rest of them? Like the ones picturing the water baptisms? I did. But i didn't see them in Da Way. I saw them in some old newsletters displayed at BG Leonard's 90th birthday party, which we hosted for him. I was just casually leafing through some old ones and you can imagine the jolt I got when my eyes landed on a familiar picture. It was the old "1st Piffle Class" photo I'd seen so many times. As you know, Wierwille had recently taken Leonard's class. He returned to O-hiya to teach Leonard's class with Leonard's blessing. The accompanying article was about this Rev. Wierwille teaching CTC's Gifts of the Spirit course to members of his congregatin in O-hiya. Hmmm. Turns out wierwille lied to the man, co-oted the man's work as his own. FAMILIAR PATTERN!"

It was TheEvan, not dmiller, who posted it. "Back to Leonard. Being cataloger of old photos and such, surely you are familiar with the photos of Wierwille's first two "PFAL" classes? Well, most everybody was, as they were published often enough. Did you ever see the rest of them? Like the ones picturing the water baptisms? I did. But i didn't see them in Da Way. I saw them in some old newsletters displayed at BG Leonard's 90th birthday party, which we hosted for him. I was just casually leafing through some old ones and you can imagine the jolt I got when my eyes landed on a familiar picture. It was the old "1st Piffle Class" photo I'd seen so many times. As you know, Wierwille had recently taken Leonard's class. He returned to O-hiya to teach Leonard's class with Leonard's blessing. The accompanying article was about this Rev. Wierwille teaching CTC's Gifts of the Spirit course to members of his congregatin in O-hiya. Hmmm. Turns out wierwille lied to the man, co-oted the man's work as his own. FAMILIAR PATTERN!" (From the thread, "Craig and VP's relationship", page 3. 1/17/2005)

BTW, TheEvan's post was on the thread "Craig and VP's relationship?" and was about 1/2way down the 3rd page. Craig and VP's relationship? - Page 3 - About The Way - GreaseSpot Cafe

This got lost in the middle of the thread.

Ok, I was wrong, It was TheEvan who posted about Leonard. " (1/17/05, 12:04pm) "...surely you are familiar with the photos of Wierwille's first two 'PFAL' classes? Well, most everybody was, as they were published often enough. Did you ever see the rest of them? Like the ones picturing the water baptisms? I did. But I didn't see them in Da Way. I saw them in some old newsletters displayed at BG Leonard's 90th birthday party, which we hosted for him. I was just casually leafing through some old ones and you can imagine the jolt I got when my eyes landed on a familiar picture. It was the old "1st Piffle Class" photo I'd seen so many times. As you know, Wierwille had recently taken Leonard's class. He returned to O-hiya to teach Leonard's class with Leonard's blessing. The accompanying article was about this Rev. Wierwille teaching CTC's Gifts of the Spirit course to members of his congregation in O-hiya. Turns out wierwille lied to the man, co-opted the man's work as his own. FAMILIAR PATTERN! All of which disqualifies him in any way from having been in public ministry of any kind. Period. However you burnish it and photograph it with a warm hazy glow, the conclusion is clear in the harsh light of day." ======================= My reply...... [Here's what that means in plainer English. vpw takes Leonard's class. vpw REtakes Leonard's class. vpw then goes off for a few months by himself. vpw tells Leonard "I'd like to run your CTC's Gifts of the Spirit course to my local congregation." Leonard concludes that this would bless that single congregation, and approves this, giving his blessing for this one Gifts of the Spirit class. vpw then prepares to run "his" class-using Leonard's material but slapping his name on it, and calling it "Power For Abundant Living" rather than "Gifts of the Spirit". While vpw tells the new students it is HIS class, he tells Leonard he is running LEONARD's class, and even provides Leonard with a copy of the class photos for Leonard's scrapbook. Leonard, trusting other Christians as he does, believes vpw and does not realize vpw is lying through his teeth until later, after vpw has run several of "his" classes.]

Ok, StayedTooLong posted this Aug 18, 2022 on this thread. However, he posted it inside someone else's quote, so you had to compare the original post to see that STL had added it. I think that was all accidental- especially when it was important. Here's what he posted: ================================ "I can definitely relate to the slow indoctrination TWI put me through. As a completely broken man, I was sitting at a lunch counter one afternoon and a WOWII entered the restaurant and sat on the stool next to me. He started up a cordial conversation discussing the university I was attending. Soon the subject turned to the bible about a man bring saved by grace and not of works. This was something that rocked my world for the better. I was living under such condemnation being taught by the RC, and believed there was no way I was not going to hell when I died. It had permeated my entire being and all my thoughts and movements. To hear I had eternal life and absolutely nothing could take it away, lifted my spirits like nothing ever had in the past. I was mentally free at last. As time progressed, and I began to see cracks in how TWI conducted itself, I refused to believe it because they had saved my life. I did not want to acknowledge this life saving group was a fraud. As an example, our limb guy had met B.G. Leonard, who was reaching his class on the holy spirit in our state. We were insructed by our limb leader to takes Leonard’s class, and what an eye opener it was for all of us. We all knew by heart the definitions of the gifts of the holy spirit, because of taking PFAL. It became crystal clear Wierwille had plagiarized Leonard’s class, but in my mind I refused to believe it, because it would destroy the ministry that had taken be from almost death to life. I refused to believe all the other crap that came to life after the fog years, also. It took about 20 more years for me to finally admit to myself TWI and VPW were a fraud. I had been so indoctrinated, without my knowledge, that TWI had the only truth from God’s word, and any other group was of the devil. Thankfully, they actually M&A me, so I had to leave. " ====================== Here's what T-Bone replied the same day. (He'd written the original post and knew what part was added.) "Wow STL, that’s the first I’ve heard of someone other than wierwille sitting through BG Leonard’s class. I imagine that would be an eye-opening experience. I tell you how indoctrinated I was – for my 12 years of involvement it never occurred to me wierwille had plagiarized Bullinger’s work…and I had bought Bullinger’s How to Enjoy the Bible in TWI’s bookstore right after I took PFAL – and it was a fav of mine. Not like Bullinger was 100% right on everything – but at the time, comparing PFAL with How to Enjoy the Bible - my pea-brain saw it as two very intelligent people coming up with the same ideas…Guess it was a Kool-Aid inducement of great minds think alike. I’m glad you left! thanks for sharing such a revealing experience – and as always, I appreciate your thoughtful input. ============================================= Now that I saw all that, I can respond. [Actually, attending Leonard's class while in twi or even ex-twi is rare, but this wasn't the first post on the subject. TheEvan posted on it Jan 17, 2005, 12:04pm.] "...surely you are familiar with the photos of Wierwille's first two 'PFAL' classes? Well, most everybody was, as they were published often enough. Did you ever see the rest of them? Like the ones picturing the water baptisms? I did. But I didn't see them in Da Way. I saw them in some old newsletters displayed at BG Leonard's 90th birthday party, which we hosted for him. I was just casually leafing through some old ones and you can imagine the jolt I got when my eyes landed on a familiar picture. It was the old "1st Piffle Class" photo I'd seen so many times. As you know, Wierwille had recently taken Leonard's class. He returned to O-hiya to teach Leonard's class with Leonard's blessing. The accompanying article was about this Rev. Wierwille teaching CTC's Gifts of the Spirit course to members of his congregation in O-hiya. Turns out wierwille lied to the man, co-opted the man's work as his own. FAMILIAR PATTERN! " ================================ [I had responded. Here's what that means in plainer English. vpw takes Leonard's class. vpw REtakes Leonard's class. vpw then goes off for a few months by himself. vpw tells Leonard "I'd like to run your CTC's Gifts of the Spirit course to my local congregation." Leonard concludes that this would bless that single congregation, and approves this, giving his blessing for this one Gifts of the Spirit class. vpw then prepares to run "his" class-using Leonard's material but slapping his name on it, and calling it "Power For Abundant Living" rather than "Gifts of the Spirit". While vpw tells the new students it is HIS class, he tells Leonard he is running LEONARD's class, and even provides Leonard with a copy of the class photos for Leonard's scrapbook. Leonard, trusting other Christians as he does, believes vpw and does not realize vpw is lying through his teeth until later, after vpw has run several of "his" classes."]

King James Bible Therefore when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. ==================================== That reminds me. When vpw taught on this very verse, he made an amazingly obvious mistake. He read that out loud. Then he said that they had no reward. Uh, reading may be fundamental, but comprehension is essential! Didn't he understand all the words he just read? The hypocrites made a public display of their religious giving. Why? "THAT THEY MAY HAVE GLORY OF MEN." So, people could applaud them and say what generous people they are. THAT is their reward. For all the good it does them. And they accept that and do it FOR that reward. But vpw said they had NO reward. Now, they may not have had any reward FROM GOD, but they had A reward, and it was one of their own choosing. IIRC, that was right in pfal. I tried not to dwell on it, but every single time that was played, that bothered me. It was an incredibly obvious mistake to make. I mean, if I misspoke and said that, I'd turn around and immediately CORRECT MYSELF for misspeaking. vpw just went on as if that made perfect sense. Sometimes I think he just recited stuff by rote, as in "if it's on the teleprompter, he'll read it aloud no matter what it says."

1."Hello, and welcome to "TV Car Trivia!" First question, who was the driver of a '73 Firebird? Uh, Otto?" 2."Uh, Jim Rockford, "Rockford Files"." 3."Gimme "Columbo"." 4."A Peugeot convertible." 1."What color?" 4."Gray." 5."How do you know that?" 4."'Cause I love that show." 5."Man, I got three words for all of y'all: Get a life!" 6."What's on Magnum P.I.'s license plate?" 7."ROBIN-1" 4."Wait, wasn't Robin that faggoty guy that always hung with him?" 8."Naw, that was Higgins. That was Higgins." 2."Hey, hey, ten points for our fearless leader. Sway, how about giving us the Bill Bixby trifecta?" 3."Drove a Corvette in "The Magician", a Ford pickup truck in "The Incredible Hulk", and in "The Courtship of Eddie's Father", he walked. " This remake did well enough in the box office, but I can't help think part of that was due to the advertising. One supporting character was made to look like a main character with most of the screen-time. This is one of the appearances in media of the "coroner with an iron stomach" type of thing. When one character answers the phone, he's at work in a crematorium. He puts down his sandwich- on the corpse- to answer the phone. "If his unpleasant wounding has in some way enlightened the rest of you as to the grim finish beneath the glossy veneer of criminal life, then his injuries carry with it an inherent nobility, and a supreme glory. We should all be so fortunate. You say 'poor Toby'? I say 'poor us'. " Cast includes Delroy Lindo, Christopher Eccleston, Giovanni Ribisi, Arye Gross.