Oakspear

I don't remember Martindale ever saying that you could get possessed by taking the PFAL class, but I have been away from that nonsense for 20 years, so maybe. But he did push the whole concept of "old wineskins" when it came to a lot of Wierwille-produced material, almost like it was a 20th century version of dispensationalism. Advanced Class grads weren't Advanced Class grads any more if you didn't take his class, you got reproved if you wore your old WOW pin to a Way function. I think there was more Wierwille-focused loyalty than he anticipated.

And for those of us still in during the WayAP years - Martindale came up with his own version of the Advanced Class which meant all of us Advanced Class grads were no longer Advanced Class grads and had to spend the time and money to get our butts to get to New Knoxville to take the new class. And it came complete with brand spankin' new name tags: white on blue! Yay! Once I made the mistake of wearing my "old wineskins" white-on-green nametag at a Way function and got reproved for it.

I mentioned that TWI plated the seeds of their own destruction. Even though so much of what they promulgated was illogical nonsense, some of the methodology encouraged us to look at Way doctrine critically and question it later on when we weren't so ignorant or naïve. Understanding verses in the context, in light of Biblical era customs etc were all good tools for understanding the Bible - tools that Wierwille undoubtedly intended merely as cover for his agenda of command & control, but turned out to be effective means to unravel the BS.

Of course they didn't get answered. I can only speak for myself, but I didn't know squat about the Bible before I got involved in The Way Corporation. Wierwille's explanations, as ridiculous as they sound from my current vantage point, made sense to my ignorant teenaged self. It's easy! Point to a Bible verse that appears to contradict mainstream church teachings. Do this enough times and you've undermined the credibility of mainstream Christianity to the newbies who don't know anything. In some ways TWI planted the seeds for its own destruction by emphasizing Biblical research (even though they didn't mean it).

I thought that slur was spelled "wop"? I always referred to it as the WayAP class, although a lot of people called it the WAP (pronounced to rhyme with "wrap") Class. At some point Martindale decreed that we should call it "the Way Class"...

Wierwille, after spending the first four sessions of PFAL repeating in various iterations that the Bible is without error, then spends a few sessions pointing out contradictions (or "apparent" contradictions if you will) and then shows you how they're not really contradictions...here's what it really says, what it really means, building up his own street cred as someone who can uncover the truth when every denomination in history got it wrong. That was the real purpose of PFAL, beneath the veneer of Biblical research that any Joe Schmoe could do was the idea that it was Wierwille who's conclusions should be trusted without question. If anyone questioned Wierwille's conclusions they were strongly encouraged to "hold it in abeyance", since obviously you were missing something if your conclusions were different than Wierwille's. Which was why things that made no sense, even within the context of "research" that Wierwille pushed, were accepted, at least provisionally. Things like "The Great Principle", or the idea that the original sin of Adam & Eve was masturbation, or the thundering herd of grammatical errors and leaps of illogic that filled so much of his "teaching"

That whole "Great Principle" thing made no sense. God can't communicate except to what he is, i.e. spirit? But somehow that spirit that he "created in you" can communicate to your mind?

I was still in when this announcement was made. I remember that my first thought was "How does that make ANY sense?". It was so self-evidently wrong, but we were then bombarded with "explanations" of why it was true. At the time my state had less than a handful of anemic twigs in two cities. There was supposedly a twig in Hong, so the Word was over Asia, a handful of twigs in Europe, so the Word was over Europe. How silly

Probably they were better at unjustified self-confidence...

I was actually kicked out rather than leaving under my own steam. The whole situation that culminated in Martindale getting fired was the turning point for me. I started questioning everything and began participated in WayDale and Grease Spot under the "Twybil" and "Taoiseach" handles. I was mainly sticking around in order to convince my wife to leave with me. Not to make this a long story but I was found out and kicked out. Two months later my wife kicked me out. It took a while, but I got my life back.

Feel free to stop by in person next time you're in the neighborhood

And another thing... The Advanced Class was one of the biggest disappointments in my early Way career. After seeing how the first three "manifestations" were practiced and critiqued until it was seen that we could do them, the lack of any practical instruction in the other six was a letdown. Discerning of spirits became an excuse to denounce others And was there every a definition of the "manifestation of believing" that made even a little sense?

The no-debt policy was just another control mechanism. Sure, if you went straight from college to Way staff and never worked a non-Way job and thought you had the rest of your life subsidized by the "believers", a life without any debt sounds doable. I agree that a lot of credit card debt is harmful, and it's easy to get in over your head and never get out...with nothing to show for it, but for most people buying a home without a bank loan is impossible. Even paying cash for a decent car is out of the question for many. Of course, Way people with family connections could always get by. A guy in our area owned his home through some financial gymnastics: his mom and dad took out the loan and were the legal owners; he and his parents drew up some arcane legal document where he would gain a percentage of the home equal to the fraction of the purchase price represented by his monthly payment to his folks. They rationalized that it wasn't really debt, since if he didn't make any more payments he would still own the percentage of the house that his previous payments represented. "Leadership" felt this didn't violate the no-debt policy. Yet my 20 year old son was excoriated for being in debt because he had to pay in after doing his taxes rather than receiving a refund.

A typical Way-brained approach. It couldn't just be that it was raining; after all, YOU weren't the one who hit another vehicle, you were the one who was hit. The Way method was always find a way to overthink every aspect of life and make you get down on yourself for not believing.

I recall a woman telling me the same thing. I know what her results were: not good!

Thanks!

Next month will mark 20 years out of The Way Corporation for me. Time flies when you're not mired in cultish servitude! I don't spend much time here at the cafe any more, but I DO lurk once in a while

I left twice. In 1982 I got married without the "blessing" of "leadership" with the added bonus of having failed to secure enough Corps sponsorship to get accepted into the 13th Corps. I got into a few arguments with the Limb Leader over various things and stopped going to Way functions. However, in my heart and mind I still believed it all and just chalked up the problems to bad leadership. Around 1990 my wife and I started considering going back. We were unaware of the turmoil that had been occurring. My oldest step son was about the right age for PFAL so we signed him up and started, little by little, to get involved again. We were pretty involved, even were Twig Leaders for a few years. After Martindale's demotion I started following WayDale and later Grease Spot Cafe and became very skeptical about what was being taught. I was also becoming vocal about expressing my skepticism around leadership. Eventually they figured out who I was on Grease Spot and kicked me out. That was November 2001. 20 year anniversary coming up!

Amen If I wasn't supposed actually being at work now, I could point to dozens of examples where Wierwille was using the work done by Bullinger and completely missed the point that Bullinger was making. Same with other authors he plagiarized. An example that comes to mind though is Wierwille's explanation of the word that is translated "interpretation". He clearly lifts his explanation and illustration from Bullinger' How to Enjoy the Bible but completely muffs it. Bullinger, in his example of unleashing dogs upon the game emphasizes the unleashing part (the word is in other places translated "revealing" or "unveiling". Wierwille either misunderstands or purposely misleads by emphasizing that the dogs were attacking the game in a frenzy, shooting way wide of the point that Bullinger was making

Interesting illustration a few posts back about controlling the future by controlling the past & controlling the past by controlling the present, and how we often bought into the made-up "memories" of Wierwille and his inner circle. Another 1984 line that gets quoted a lot is the one about not believing the evidence of your own eyes. "The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.” During the end of my sojourn in TWI I had some question about what they were telling us about Bullinger's 'Witness of the Stars'. I remember Wierwille making the statement "And that's why there are no stars in The North". What? There ARE stars in the north...they're all over the damn place! I didn't give it much thought until many years later Martindale brought it up. He admitted that he too was puzzled by that statement. He then pointed to the map of the constellations in the back of 'Witness of the Stars' and told us that it meant that there was a gap, representing 'the mystery' in between Ursa Major & Ursa Minor that contained no stars. Soon after that I was out camping, and away from the city lights, you could plainly see a truckload of stars in the supposed gap. When I brought it up to "leadership" they "explained" that back then they didn't know about all the constellations that we know about now since they didn't have telescopes. That statement made so little sense, and was so ridiculous on the face of it, it was one of the steps to me getting out the YTWI door

You may...I always enjoy a good pun

700 weddings and counting, including my wife's weddings in 14 years

I got an internet ordination 15 years ago so I could officiate at weddings. I use "Reverend" on my website and business cards, but I like people to call me by my first name. Some people at weddings insist on calling me "pastor" or "reverend" though.

Throughout the 90's and into 2000 Martindale was replacing much of what had been built under Wierwille and replacing it was his own brain farts. PFAL was replaced with The Way of Abundance & Power (WayAP); various "advanced studies" classes, e.g. Dealing With the Adversary, Witnessing & Undershepherding, Christian Family & Sex and others were replaced with classes taught by Martindale or other loyalists; The WOW program was replaced by Way Disciples; The Rock of Ages was eliminated; Martindale's book 'The Rise & Expansion of the Christian Church in The First Century' was promoted. Minor things like wearing your old green advanced class nametag or WOW pin were banned as "old wineskins". I was kicked out in 2001, so I don't know if this was reversed, but it would make sense that Martindale's contribution would be erased. What would it be replaced with? I thought I've seen references to Wierwille being emphasized again, but I don't know

I wonder if anyone from TWI monitors this site any more. 20 years ago there were a large numbers of "innies" participating in GSC, and they were checking here to see whom to purge. I was shown the door after they figured out from my posts who I was