Mike

The most memorable written re-formulation of a doctrine by TWI was in JCPS regarding the star of Bethlehem. But it was not a written retraction, like what I am proposing to them, when I talk about ECNs, which are Engineering Change Notices used in the tech industries. An ECN has both the old way and the new way explicitly written, sometimes in synopsis form if the full story is too long. Plus it was a "soft re-formulation" in the sense that VPW or any of the leadership superstars. It was written by Peter B*****ger, who was kicked out of the Corps with great infamy not long after his Way Magazine article on the Star of Bethlehem was published. The totally changed reformation in JCPS a few years later was NOT accompanied by any written mention of the old magazine article, so it is not as good as a full ECN.

Yes, one monogamous relationship after another happens a lot. But when you stand back and look at such an entire life of one mate alone and then another mate alone, you see many mates, and not just one. So I was implying, with my made up terms, that the prefix "mono" is misleading there. Standing back and looking at many entire lives, you see ONLY three possibilities: (1) zero mates per person, or (2) one mate per person, or (3) multiple mates per person. I'm not sure what to call the first one. The second SHOULD (in a sense) be called monogamy, and the third should be called polygamy. I think the current definitions are a bit sloppy, and would like to re-define them for clarity. I know that is impossible, but thought it ought to be pointed out that our current definition of monogamy is a bit misleading. Things get even more complicated when you include common law marriages, and one-night stands that stretch out to a few months. This last is VERY common now in hook-up youth culture. I call them "pretend marriages." */*/*/*/* But nomenclature aside, I am seeking verses that can fill in my understanding of permitted OT polygamy, meaning multiple simultaneous wives. I am thinking that Abraham was a polygamist in this sense. Maybe Moses too, but very unsure there. Then there is the OT use of concubines that really throws me! I hear David and Solomon had them, but again, never searched all this out.... yet. I have no idea how concubines fit under God's Word and will. I am hoping that someone here has done that already.

I don't get that. Serial refers to more than one but one at a time. Unless it is a joke . That would make it wildly different than the serious stuff.

I am a very distant viewer of these things, so please correct me where I am wrong, and/or fill in the gaps for me. I realize some here prohibit this, but I don't; I made up the terms below from logic and observations. On googling them I see that my terms can only temporary, so please bear with me on this. Also PLEASE do not draw inferences from this for application to any person we know. I am NOT trying to do that. I am trying to learn some things in a field I have profound ignorance. */*/*/* Our modern culture follows and somewhat approves of serial polygamy, or one wife at a time. For a while, the main place where it was prohibited was the U.S. Presidency, but that ended with Reagan. Most other cultures, especially ancient, follow and approve of parallel polygamy, or many wives at the same time. I think, but am not sure, that the Bible allows this in the OT, but only if each wife is supported, and treated as equals. Sound pretty impossible to me, and if anyone has verses, I'd like to see them. I know the Bible says NT minister should not engage in this.

You need not use the word "hope" for this. I was referring to Luke's Acts of the Apostles, where he spills the beans on ministry mistakes so discretely, that VPW had to point out that men of God make mistakes, as he taught of Paul's journey to Jerusalem. The translators missed it and bent the KJV with a comma, to make it look like Paul was doing the will of the Lord, when he was not. They missed it for its subtlety, Luke was so discrete, and figured it had to go the way they wrongly worked it.

It looks like that happened at TWI in the past, and I know it happened with lots of individuals. I am wary of the University system, but I also benefit greatly from it. It is comforting to know that now there are a few HQ people w PhDs from elsewhere.

Yes !!! And echo chamber lovers hate any kind of challenge or disruption of that echo. I call it intellectual inbreeding. A PFAL grad's balance can be seen in how many people from "both" sides they can fellowship and learn from. I marvel at the wonders of learning I get from hanging out with both sides of intense political elections and issues.

Can you image Luke going through childish histrionics like yours when he exposed, in Acts, the many errors of Peter, the huge stupid nostalgic error of Paul, the short sightedness of Barnabas, the possessed elders in Jerusalem? It only takes a love of truth for a mature person to see that banning a research paper the condemns adultery is no way to cover up something bad. Have you ever contemplated what it means in 1 Cor 13 when it says love rejoices not in iniquity? Have you ever been in a position where you could get real sharp on that verse by getting some practice at applying it? No? Never? Never ever? Think hard. Maybe call that friend.

Did you see the line where I said I have posted this story before here? Maybe twice? What did I do about confronting leadership? I knew it would fall on deaf ears (branch leader, 6th Corps, later Rev.) because he was a big believer in sex being legal in the NT. You know, the spiritual adultery crap. There were lots of Corps mouthing that and some of the other 13 rationalizations. I knew that if there was something that I could DO about the problem it would be limited to my twig. I did what I could and I got good results. Then I went WoW and and not too much later the ministry melted down. I did something from my lowly position of just a twig leader and non-Corps. What are You doing to confront leadership about this problem at the moment. Actually, I am informing the WayGB about it right now, I hope. If they know a proPFAL'68 and a PFAL-T grad like me is posting this stuff, they will take if more seriously than by them reading it here from other posters. I asked you if you talk to any TWI. Don't know if you answered it or not because my time is too scarce today, and I haven't read any posts. I just scanned through the pages to see if you were there. At least you don't resort to the crazy jeering and mocking the others favor. I appreciate having a civil conversation with you much more than the youngsters here. Have you considered lightening up on the hate and suspicions and giving the new folks at TWI a chance to recover from the calamity HQ has been for so long? Remember 1 Cor 13, and agape thinks no evil. That is a difficult challenge, to love your enemies, that is. I think someone famous said that was a good thing to strive for. How many enemies have you loved today?

Here is the account I gave to a friend in a letter some time ago. It demonstrates how I was fully aware of real nasty issues, along side MUCH exaggeration. */*/*/* Have you considered reading the Schoenheit adultery paper from 1986? If you haven't, it will explain a lot, but it is also very troubling. I first saw it in 1987, and I was shocked. Not shocked at the contents, but that Craig and Walter and Geer banned it with all the gusto, and lies they could conjure up. The ONLY doctrinal point it brings up is that adultery and fornication are against God’s Word. One of the reasons it troubled me so much is that 8 years earlier, I had to "write" a similar paper. What happened was a carload of young believers from Maine moved to SD around 1979-80 and landed in my twig. Within weeks one of them was sleeping with one of the girls that lived in my little way home, where my twig was. I tried to ignore it until I saw it bothered one of the new believers who also lived there with us. I blew the whistle and told the two lovers to get a room outside our way home next time, that it was forbidden in my house. That caused a ruckus, but I stood my ground. One of the lovers started spouting off one of the 14 excuses that were circulating around the ministry for years, so I said for the next several days we were going to research the Word on this issue. We worked Young's Concordance on adultery and fornication, just like Schoenheit did 8 years LATER. Then we collected together as many of these excuses or seduction lines as we could remember hearing over the years in the rumor mill and over coffee. We collected about 10 of them. This, again, is exactly what Schoenheit did 8 years LATER. His paper was professional and ours was amateur. He had 14 appendixes, we had 10. We had arrived at exactly the same conclusions. It actually WORKED! The lovers stopped hassling us and eventually married, and I was the best man. They are still married today. Everyone else was happy, even the kids from Maine. Maine was the last place Jimmy D was limb leader of. Another friend, who was also from Maine and was the rock star musician type told me he had attended orgies at Limb HQ and thought it was beautiful. He was pretty jaded. His favorite joke was "I have 2 kids... that I know of." A few years later an unknown son of age 30 from Maine contacted him for a reunion. When I first saw the Schoenheit paper in 1987 I was furious, and still am. There are deep reasons why the ministry melted down in 1986, and this paper was the KEY catalyst. It has been swept under the rug by all TWI administrations since 1986. I want to see it fully aired (properly and lovingly) as one of the ECN projects.

Not so. Where did you get that idea from? From me or from the INCESSANT jeering and mocking of me? I think SOME things are exaggerated. I think some things are totally factual, but the spins can be exaggerated. When I saw the Schoenheit Paper in July 1987 I was pretty much convinced that TWI had bit the dust. I was also pi$$ed at VPW for leaving such a mess. That was at the END of my pondering. I was pi$$ed at Craig, Walter, and Geer for suppressing a VERY NEEDED research paper, when I first saw it. Have you heard my testimony here about an amateur pre-Schoenheit Paper that I did in 1980, eight years before Schoenheit did his? No? Maybe the jeering and mocking drowned it out for you. It was needed in my twig. I was the twig leader. I will search out some of my write-ups of it and post it again. What I did with my twig for almost 2 weeks was to work adultery and fornication from Young's Concordance. JUST LIKE SCHOENHEIT's. Then we collected together as many of the TVTs that we could remember that were circulating for years, that were justifications or excuses to commit adultery or fornication with impunity. We collected and worked about 10 of them, JUST LIKE SCHOENHEIT's collection of 14 excuses. I had a head start over many posters here in that I knew SOMETHING was rotten in Denmark many years before the 1986 meltdown. Twinky, had you ever heard this story from me? I posted it once, maybe twice around 2003-2007. Trust me I've probably known the scandals, but from a great distance, longer than anyone here. Maybe a few knew more and longer, but just a few. These things tore me up in the early 1980s because there was no one to talk to about it. By 1987 I was really pi$$ed that HQ had HEAVY HANDEDLY and devilishly suppressed the Schoenheit paper. For the next 12 years I drifted around trying to figure things out. Then in 1998 I slowly realized that what I was taught was still the Word, and much bigger than all these relatively much smaller social/sexual problems. I did this far from TWI and the Geerites. You are totally ignorant of my position(s) and are totally wrong about me thinking all was exaggerated. Are you going to retain this one tid-bit of truth from me or forget it? I know that many very bad things happened at TWI and they all got shoved under the rug and still need to be dealt with. I just totally disagree with the fake "solutions" to all this that so many are cranking out for 20+ years now. The expose job was finished many years ago. It is time to start thinking solutions, if you really want to see a solution.

There is more than one version of the other side. The religion-like, cult-like tactics that can happen often here in GreaseSpot cause much of your version of the other side to skew way off in the negative direction, JUST LIKE the twi version skews off in the whitewash/coverup direction. I am one of the FEW grads who can fellowship with both sides, and try to get a more balanced handle on things. */*/*/* Refusing to acknowledge "mainstream" Christians has evaporated in the local leadership, if they ever had that problem. I will find out more about how they are on this at HQ as I get to know them. I go to them to find out how they think. You might want try and reconnect with some to see for yourself what the CURRENT situation is there. It's been38 years since the Schoenheit paper melted everything down. That is more than a generation. Get current, is my suggestion. */*/*/* You wrote: "And - Mike - you can't even see "the other side." You think everything's exaggerated. So how can you possibly write a balanced view? By the way, have you finished reading "the other side" as set out in Charlene's book yet? " I look at BOTH SIDES intensely, and personally, and face-to-face, telephone to telephone when possible. Can you say your research of the current is from evidence? Or is it from intense repetition of memory and speculation? Do you have ANY contact with even just one person there? I work both sides intensely. I read MUCH that is posted here. Yes I have resumed reading "Undertow" because in my reading here I picked up the news that it is more focused on the research end of the ministry, which I have some first hand understanding of, and feel half way competent to understand the issues deeply.

I thought it was a good question so I worked on it and asked around. Think I solved it, for me at least. I posted it in this thread, but it was in the heat of battle (as usual) and I may need to tweak it a bit someday.

What I mean by calling this a religion is the same human dynamics that make religions inefficient ways to get to truth and make love happen don't work. Maybe I should use the word "cult" instead of religion. It is the methods and ways doctrine is enforced, like that video above got into, that goes on here in spades, or at least wherever I end up posting. I know that not all are of the same mind and methods here. I am giving a average accounting of the HEAVY POSTERS here, and not the less active posters. You, Twinky, have not resorted to the hate over love as much as others. I can actually have a civil conversation with you. I can't with the more "religious" heavy posters here. They employ religious shunning, shaming, jeering, insulting... all the "melt your face" techniques that the most rotten Corps leaders used long ago. They are keeping that Corps taint preserved here, while is it nearly gone at TWI, especially on the field. I am still getting to know people at HQ, but that is going slower. You stand by and watch people do their utmost to tear me down, just like the video above talks about. Can't you see you are doing the same thing ((( with your silence on the massive violations against love, civil decorum, and meaningful discussion with me by many others ))) the same way TWI people watched in silence as leaders everywhere practiced the 14 Appendixes to the Schoenheit paper years ago. Why don't you see that this is turning into a hate cult for some of the active posters, especially when I post? If you do see it, and do nothing to call it out, then you are to blame also. Did you see Nathan_Jr's posts near the top of this thread to me that justified use of traumatic shaming and jeering? Please do read it and see if you would accept it if an expert Corps face melter uttered the exact same words Nathan uttered. Did you read those posts?

I didn't say it was perfect. I disagree with some parts, and see some parts missing. I think I it said was a start. But that may have been from a conversation I had with a TWI member who also gave me a similar timeline, just yesterday. But I did add johniam's timeline (or an analysis) to my collection for future compilations and a more balanced re-working. I include some of the timelines and lists you and T-Bone have posted over the years as well. I want to start writing a balanced history of TWI, and an unvarnished history, and a hate-free history. Neither TWI nor GSC is well practiced at hearing both sides and synthesizing a loving, thoughtful, THOROUGH history. I'd like some people here to help me, and I want some TWI people to help me. I want to see a something like a committee written history that is balanced and really uses love to consider all the points from both sides on this issue.

Actually GSC is late to the party. Ralph D and John L beat GSC to the punch by over 10 years in 1987, and then 1989-98. Then GSC did a good job duplicating Waydale for posterity, and published the Schoenheit paper, and then discussed it for years and years. All that happened 20 and 25 years ago. It is NOW (and I think mainly only on the About the Way forum) that GSC repeats and repeats all the same basic messages, and with less and less love every year. The exposition of the problem has been accomplished LONG AGO! It is high time to start looking for loving solutions, because continuing the more and more hateful approach to force change there is just ruining the haters with blindness. The hate is failing. Exposing the problem is a done deal.

Wrong! The real threat of lawsuits and bankruptcy are a looming thread. Are you blind to that? You get an "F" in your math. They also have to consider the hearts of new Christians there. Yes, you ARE blind, to these two huge blocks to them moving fast on this.

No, it is changing its PERSONNEL, and the policies changes are following (slowly).

No, that is not enough. And, Twinky, I too thought that was a great post. OldSkool, the passage from you that Twinky quoted in her post was also good. I have been discussing with a few TWI leaders scattered about the country this exact thing, and I have brought it up here how other companies accomplish what TWI needs to do in this area. Your phrase "teach to it" seems to capture the essence of my proposal, but I think it might be tweakable to make it even more efficacious. Right now, as is, it is pretty effective. Maybe the phrase "teach it away" referring to the 14 Appendixes in the Schoenheit paper. The proposal I have made to several TWI leaders (not all official leaders, but all long-standing and smart) is what all high tech companies use for handling changes in complicated, highly detailed products. I'm talking about ECNs, or Engineering Change Notices. I've been writting about this for so long now that I have learned to spell Schoenheit correctly! An ECN is a written memo to all department heads, who then distribute it to all those who need it. In this case of sex crimes, that would include pretty much everyone who is not a paraplegic or worse. But even they (if any exist) could use the info, if only to minister it to others. An ECN in the manufacturing sector has two main sections, what the old (and now incorrect) way or method was, and what the new and correct way to do it. Both are necessary, for ultimate clarity. An ECN never contains any blame or history as to why the change was made. None of that is necessary to get the new policy implemented. However, there may be a department that DOES investigate how it went wrong, or why the old inefficient method was chosen, so that they might avoid similar inefficiencies in the future. */*/*/*/* When the Scheonheit paper was suppressed I knew for sure that the problems at HQ were very big in this area. TWI may be trying to wait it all out till all those within TWI still harboring the old wrong policy die off. Similarly, for all the offended ones who left TWI and are a lawsuit waiting to happen, waiting for them to die off may be part of their silence plan. I am operating within 1 Cor.13, and doing my best to think no evil here when I discuss the Schoenheit paper with them. The method I depend on is love. I reject the sledghammer approach favored here. Hate gets us nowhere, and it makes the hater become what is focused on as a hate object. Look at how 20 years of hating me have gotten you all nowhere! It just gives me that obiwankenobi greater strength every time to resist your attacks on me even better. Have you had ANY results deprogramming anyone out of the errors from TWI with hate and less than loving techniques? I genuinely love those people, as I genuinely love the believers here. I see both sides as dug in and un-hearing of each other. But that standoff started to crack when Rosalie left, and I now have inroads of loving discussions going on with leaders. Who wants to experiment with the approach to see change within TWI? OR, do you like having an imovable, predictable enemy in your Christian brothers and sisters still in TWI? How many "members" of TWI do you (rhetorical plural) hang out with and discuss things in a civil manner? Do you have ANY fellowship or civil discussions with TWI people? If it is zero, then WHY? Why not try the love way? If it is zero, then my suggestions to you all are a new approach, an un-turned stone. You you want any solutions, or would a solution to this problem disrupt the hate religion, the anti-idol worship, that is so loved by many here? Hate blinds people, it's time to open eyes here and try some better methods. Hate blinds, people! 1 John 2: 9-11 Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates a brother or sister is still in the darkness. Anyone who loves their brother and sister lives in the light, and there is nothing in them to make them stumble. But anyone who hates a brother or sister is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness. They do not know where they are going, because the darkness has blinded them.

What's up is that this TWI thing is a lot more complicated than most know, and there are many nuances to the various "sides" here. You think there is only ONE other side to what all happened. TWI has the wrong side, and you have the pure truth right side, and there is ONLY ONE true other side in this religion that has been actively forming here over the years. I came here to say there are more things to consider in formulating the BEST other side to what happened at TWI.

Rocky do you have any idea how I originally arrived posting here at GreaseSpot? Get ready for a big victim claim. Are you sitting down? Don't be walking around reading this on a phone. I came to GreaseSpot against my will, in a very strong sense. Before I ever posted my first post, there were people mocking and misrepresenting me. Sounds like a ridiculous lie, doesn't it? Not just a bent perspective, but a total lie? I can prove it. I have the evidence of who, when, and how. Dare you call me a liar?

Actually, you are incorrect. The purpose of GSC when I came here was "to give the other side," or something like that. When I first started posting, and for years, the software displayed little sayings next to our icons, and mine read something to the effect that I came her "to give the OTHER other side." You too are acting like this is a religion, you know the pure other side, and my other side is to ex-communicate me over. You are proving my point, and unaware of it because you fit into the mold of the "true believer" in a religion, and you want to purge the false believers. Free speech has no place when it comes to purifying the religion. So might we call your religion here The True Other Side ?

Other than that, Nathan_Jr, what did you think of my video analysis, and cult history analysis? Was I projecting my impressions of others onto her?

I hope people read your posts above very carefully, Nathan_Jr. It is almost comical how hypocritical you are. You are attempting to gaslight me. And you have no idea how transparent you are. I wouldn't be surprised if, upon sleeping on it all, you heavily edit them tomorrow.