WordWolf

You asked if he was in. I followed up by asking where and when, which caused a little confusion. But, yes, this question's worth asking. Why DID twi discourage personal testimonies? Except, of course, when vpw made them....

If it gets moved from Doctrinal, it will either get sent to Soap Opera (if it descends to drama and name-calling), or be locked and/or deleted as being off-topic even for Doctrinal. The GSC is for ex-twi, for twi survivors. No belief system is assumed or required. So, generally, discussions of belief go in Doctrinal or its skeptical subforum. There is no subforum for non-skepticism, so it's Doctrinal or post it elsewhere.

DWBH, if you could explain a little about aspiration and possible lung damage for those of us who know a lot less, I'd sure appreciate it. I don't think the OP is trying to CON anybody. I think he means everything he's posting, and genuinely loves God, and has little idea why he's being yelled at.

That is a good question. Were you ever in that organization, and, if so, where and when?

Actually, Hawkeye's question was in response to the crashing the jeep and setting himself on fire. The other incident was when Flagg's arm was healed, and Hawkeye was going to remove his cast. When he found out Hawkeye couldn't give him a medical reason to stay, he shouted and slammed that x-ray machine (or something) into his arm, smashing the cast and re-breaking his arm. Hawkeye: "NOW I can give you a medical excuse." That was "Colonel Flagg", which may or have not been his name. The other intelligence agent called him "Sam", but I think that was more to invoke "Sam" and "Ralph", the coyote and sheepdog that punch a time-clock at the beginning and end of the day. https://looneytunes.fandom.com/wiki/Ralph_Wolf_and_Sam_Sheepdog

It'll be hard to find the posts where we discussed family, since some were edited for privacy reasons. However, there's still a discussion here that included quoting him mentioning family, which will take time to find. I bumped up some discussions that overlapped this, with quotes of some overlap.

"When they came for me, I ran like a thief right into Grand Central Station. They trapped me in a pay toilet." "Beautiful." "Cost them four dollars in nickels to get me out." "I love a volunteer." One recurring character was interesting. He once claimed to be with the CIA, but said he had to stop because that made people think he was with the CIC, and he was actually with the CID all along. In fact, he once tried to get into the CIC's offices by crashing a car and setting himself on fire. He also claimed to try not to sit for more than 2 hours a day, IIRC. ("It's bad to put pressure on your brain.") He prided himself on neither laughing nor smiling. "I've trained myself not to laugh or smile. I watched a hundred hours of the Three Stooges; every time I felt like smiling or laughing, I jabbed myself in the stomach with a cattle prod."

That makes me feel more confident about my guess, then. Let's see. It sounded familiar. To be specific, that opening reminded me of Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard. So, a ST movie from "Generations" to "Nemesis", inclusive. That includes at least one good movie ("First Contact", so we count that out) and several stinkers. I think I have it down to 2 movies. To save time, I'll throw both names up, "Star Trek-Insurrection" "Star Trek- Nemesis". Raf's comment has me suspecting the latter, despite the former having funnier quotes.

Yes, that was a quote from a TV show, to be exact.

It is indeed "HAVE A CIGAR,", from PINK FLOYD. I really like the little clue that the promoter or whoever has never heard of them before and doesn't know where the name "Pink Floyd" comes from, but is enthusiastic to say he's a long-time fan while trying to get them to generate more cash.

All of this offers a credible answer which also fits the actual evidence.

Contacting them would accomplish nothing. The only thing we would prove is that they believe what they said. We all stipulated to that- we believe that they believe all of this. The further we go with this, the more of a non-story it seems. If an experience (ANY experience) leads one to live a better life and seek God, I'm for that. It doesn't have to be miraculous.

vpw went to India. ACCORDING TO HIM, while he was there, he performed LOTS of miraculous healings, including one off the back of a train for a non-Christian. ACCORDING TO HIM, he was told that India would be open to him if he ever chose to return there. He never returned there, he never did such miracles over here, and he never brought out anything documenting even one actual miracle. (We got one account of "the guy in this photo is somebody vpw healed" - but a still photo proves the man existed and was in the same room with vpw at least once. We didn't get a still photo of a man with a withered arm, then another one with the same man with a healthy arm.) vpw made a lot of CLAIMS but did not prove them. We should not believe him. This couple made a lot of CLAIMS but did not prove them. Should we believe them nevertheless, or at least wait until some real documentation comes along?

A) "Did Gary die or not?" There's no reason to think he died other than their conviction that he died. Even their account said it was a "COMA." Medicine keeping people in a coma alive is not startling, coming out of a coma is not startling, either. B) "Could he then breathe on his own without functioning lungs?" There's no reason to think his lungs were non-functional nor significantly damaged, other than her testimony. "Could this have been a miracle from God giving Gary a new set of lungs?" Possibly. Equally possible? His lungs were not damaged to the degree you were told- if at all. It's all based on their testimonies, nothing from the reporter actually spending time in the hospital. If I were to place a guess, the only reason he didn't follow up on this was that he was already supremely confident this whole story was "an exercise in creative thinking." Otherwise, he'd have been all over the hospital, getting quotes, photocopying medical reports and diagnoses and so on. C) I'm sure there's more remarkable testimonies than this one- but let's finish with this one before getting to others. As for this one, it's full of question marks. I accept he's in decent health now, and that he had some sort of attack before. Anything else would need the hospital or a doctor who treated him to document something- and this entire article skipped that step. It doesn't guarantee any of this was false, but it does nothing whatsoever to support the claims. They documented that the couple made these claims.

"When they came for me, I ran like a thief right into Grand Central Station. They trapped me in a pay toilet." "Beautiful." "Cost them four dollars in nickels to get me out." "I love a volunteer."

"Well, I've always had a deep respect, And I mean that most sincerely. The band is just fantastic, That is really what I think. Oh, and by the way, which one's 'Pink'? And did we tell you the name of the game, boy? We call it Riding the Gravy Train. We're just knocked out. We heard about the sell out. You gotta get an album out, You owe it to the people. We're so happy we can hardly count. Everybody else is just green, Have you seen the chart? It's a hell of a start, It could be made into a monster If we all pull together as a team. And did we tell you the name of the game, boy? We call it Riding the Gravy Train."

Ok, let's see.... "Gary Laude, 73, of Sebring and Muskegon, Mich., suffered a serious heart attack on Sunday, Feb. 21, 2010, and was in a coma and on life support for 15 days. He believes he visited Heaven during that time." "In the ambulance his heart stopped and also later at Mercy Hospital. He was given electric shocks 37 times." "Gary believes for 14 days he walked and talked with angels and visited patients in many hospitals in Michigan. On Day 15 his guardian angel took him by the hand and brought him back to his body, which was on life support. On Day 16 he woke up and the doctor said his lungs appeared okay." "Laude said his guardian angel since being a small boy was Jesus Christ. It was Jesus escorting him to the hospital room, who said he had to leave Heaven and go back to his body. " 'Heaven was so beautiful words cannot describe. I did not see loved ones since I was coming back. I walked with two angels.'' " "Gary said an old gray-haired nurse helped him in the hospital. A charge nurse said the old gray-haired nurse retired 10 years ago and died in 2006 but comes back on occasion as an angel to help someone who is terminally ill." "A Dr. Stewart told Laude no one had ever survived a full aspiration." "When he had his six-month checkups, the medical staff called him the "Miracle Man." " " "Gary died five times and God performed a miracle in Gary's life through divine intervention, and Gary feels compelled to tell his story wherever he goes," wrote Carol." ====================================================== The article says he was in a coma and on life-support for 15 days. Not common, but not exceptionally rare, either. Gary believes that he walked with angels and visited hospitals, and visited Heaven. All the especially odd things are all hearsay from Gary. Gary said this old nurse showed up, and Gary said a charge nurse said this dead woman shows up as an angel. Gary said a Dr Stewart said no one had ever survived a full aspiration. In fact, the whole "he was aspirated" thing was from him, as well. "When a tube was placed in his throat for breathing, a lot of his dinner left his stomach and went into his lungs, a medical term called aspiration." I'm having trouble buying that he was intubated- which in this case meant a tube placed in his throat from the outside air to his windpipe- and then his windpipe was that big that it expanded past the intubation and accepted food backed up from the esophagus. "A nurse told Carol he had a three percent chance of survival." That's awfully freaking precise. Is it common for nurses there to say things like that? I thought they were trained to never get specific about survivability, and placing percentage odds is NOT professional. Carol's part is to add "Gary died 5x and God performed a miracle." That's her conclusion and what she believes. We never get the story corroborated by the hospital. Oh, sure, the coma and so on, but not that he "died" or "some of us call him Miracle Man" or anything like that. I believe THEY believe this is an accurate account of what happened. I believe this is an accurate account of what they SAY happened. Ultimately, every reader will have to make up his mind for himself. The facts were NOT corroborated by the newspaper account, no matter who was told that. In fact, that alone makes me suspicious. If I thought I had corroborating newspaper articles, I'd carry photocopies, printouts, PDFs, etc of them. Otherwise, it's a little like "I did lots of miracles in India. Before and after that in the US, no."

It's a classic rock song, from a well-known classic rock band, and it still get airplay to this day.

Ok, I shall explain. This will take a minute. vpw had this whole "grooming the group for sex" thing. He did pajama nights with the in-house people, and did talks where he explained about sex (as if he was some expert.) BTW, as per the CFS class, once a guy's activities have resulted in him being unable to get the "little soldier" going again, he said "the only thing he can do then is sleep." I'm sure the woman is pleased as heck to hear that the guy will just go to sleep if he can't get the little guy marching again, and not even TRY anything else to make her happy. (It's all about HIM, so if HE can't get any more happiness, the show is over.) So, at one point, he was talking about some IMAGINARY tribe somewhere, where the fathers induct the daughters into sex stuff. (He was factually incorrect.) So, he mentioned that parents could do something similar "for their kids", with a few details on what they could do to their underage children, and get their bodies to react. He also claimed to have already done so with one of his kids (already mentioned, I'm not getting into names.) Strictly speaking, we do not know whether the pervert actually did this, or if this was another lie from a career liar. The evidence supports either conclusion. Either way, it was perverted of him, and he invented the entire scenario from his sick fantasies. We will never know because his kid will never come forth to "set the record straight" on this one. That's obvious for several reasons- not the least of which is that our own trolls would crucify her and lambast her- supposedly for being improper by saying this but in reality trying to punish her for ruining their saintly fantasy of vpw, and trying to silence her from speaking again on the subject. Rape victims who are harassed on the witness stand have nothing on victims of vpw who come forth- with vpw apologists showing up out of the woodwork, specially to discredit her, insult her, and try to drown out her voice. Besides, I'm sure she's moved on in her life and wants nothing more to do with him or any of this.

Ok, so in layman's terms, the article said that he ended up in the operating room being worked on. While there, he stopped breathing for several minutes more than once- during which the E.R. team kept him going artificially until his heart beat by itself. (Each time it happened.) He was in a coma when he was worked on, and probably when he arrived. When he woke up from his coma, and the trauma of the heart attack and the subsequent (successful) attempts to keep him alive when his heart took a break, he claimed to have gone to Heaven. Whether anyone believes that he actually did, or had a vision of Heaven, hallucinated the whole thing, or actually made it up is up to the reader. I believe that's as far as anyone can go- in terms of the article.

You asked how they could sleep at night, knowing what they know. I replied with an old story that illustrated that a conscience is only effective for the conscientious. Once someone is used to doing evil, it doesn't bother their conscience anymore. And yes, as long as there's humanity, that's an on-going story.