who left in '87?

[TheInvisibleDan]

Sprawled Out, I think VF's appeal was he was a streetwise Brooklyn punk - he was a tough guy - but funny and fun.

I liked him alot, we always got along great and joked around. That's why I was so disappointed to see the path he went down.

He went way overboard into legalism. I confronted him twice about it. After that we never talked. He has his own ministry now. It has gone into legalism.

Sunesis,

Out of interest, I wonder if you might provide a couple brief examples of VF's ideas/teachings/practices which struck you as "legalism" at the time.

I never knew VF, outside of seeing him on a stage.

He was like the John Saxon of twi, that 70s made-for-TV movie actor.

The balding Italian guy.

Though the late actor who played Fredo in "The Godfather" could have played VF

in a Way movie.

In any event, did his legalism appear derived from old Way doctrine, or did he come with all this stuff on his own?

Danny

Edited August 31, 2006 by TheInvisibleDan

[skyrider]

I left in '89, but was watching closely since 87. Was kicked out, basically, for not responding to Craig's request to tell him who I "stood with"....

Sunesis, who is "WM"? I got ya on VF and RD, but WM? maybe you could "pm" me. And by the way, hi! Hope all is well. My whole famdamily is sick with the flu, little guys, everyone. But we will survive :)

WM......???

Probably, W@lly M@nthie (sp?)........from that part of the country. Could be wrong, but that's who came to mind.

[Sunesis]

WM was a region leader, 4th corps grad, W**ne M**ri*l.

VF's legalism, from my vantage began after they were all fired after LCM's letter, and he decided to go with CG. Little things like, using a metronome to stay your mind while meditating on God. Telling a wonderful family of believers at WOW training they couldn't go WOW - after they had given up their apartment - do you know how hard it is to find a large apartment in NYC? He didn't tell them beforehand - nooooo, he waited until they got to HQ to spring it on them. When I found out from them at the rock I went to his room and let him have it. I told him he should be ashamed, how could he do that to people? They were devasted. He basically had no reply.

Things like running "secret" CG classes, you had to be "spiritual" enough to ask if there was anything else available.

Things like, they were checking everyone's believing. They really got into believing.

The last time I saw him I told him God was about love and not believing and their judgmentalness was way off the Word. Never saw him again after that.

His true legalism came after he left, he started a group with some corps guys - I don't know what it is now, but from people I know in that area, its kind of weird.

[sprawled out]

way to go, sunesis! i wish i'd done more of that.

there's such a streak of meanness at the core of all that. and i saw that in a lot of top "leaders" (though not all of them, to be fair). harda**, hardcore, nastiness. and basically no evidence of anything that anyone would perceive as love--except according to their twisted re-definition of it.

[WhiteDove]

Here is the link for Vince's Web Page if anyone would like to see for themselves what he is doing.

LHC

[rhino]

Oh, that WM ... he was my LC early and RC later ... glad my mind has forgotten a lot from back then.

Glad he and wife weren't into all that. It may be why more people left in some areas than others, cuz leaders were more resistant to some of the bull. I'd like to think some were anyway ... hard to believe they knew nothing about a lot of the crap tho' ... anyway ... hope they are doing well.

[WordWolf]

I was operating under the assumption that VF knew about the rapes and stuff since he

told someone to shush up.

However, I now think it was a psychological blind-spot he showed later.

Whenever anything controversial ever came up,

his response was to embrace what was most harmonious, least-contentious.

He seemed to think "that the ministry be not blamed" was an edict that meant

to silence dissent regardless of the CONTENT.

So, if you found a problem with "the establishment", his response was to

silence the objection, and it would ALWAYS be so regardless of what the problem WAS.

Of course, this strikes me as consistent with the current comments about "legalism",

in that it means a slavish worship of the organization.

It's also interesting that I also remember him responding to the firings, including his

own, by saying "If I want organic unity, I'll join a bowling league",

but was in his own way dedicated to organic unity as well when the microphone was off.

And, of course, someone might claim that the off-microphone issues don't exist,

since they contradict his press releases.

Up to each person what conclusions they'd draw.

[Rejoice]

Looking at VF's web page, I notice there is nothing that identifies "Who We Are" nor talks about anything related to their background, expertise, education. Odd.

[GrouchoMarxJr]

I suppose it's difficult to talk about your background when your Christian "education" came via a cult.

[Dot Matrix]

Sun

VF was a part of the adultery stuff, he was actually with one of our mutual friends

[My3Cents]

Thanks Sunesis,

That kind of detail about what folks did or are doing is what I come to Greasespot for. I've been showing up a lot less frequently because there's been a lot less of that kind of thing on the board. Thanks again.

[oldman]

I left in January, 1987. I was in the 15th Corps and in my last year in residence. It became very clear to me, being at Hq with RD that the ministry was going down the slippery slope and there was no hope for recovery. I called my fiance and she came and picked me up.

Funny thing is, I told Bob M. that I was leaving and said he understood and wished he had the guts to leave!!!???

[smarter]

I had actually been gradually withdrawing for some time before 87. I felt traveling to branch meetings and limb meetings, etc. had become a big waste of time. In 88 the local coordinator paid his own way to meet with Ralph Dubofsky and relayed the details to us. I throughly enjoyed smashing that PFAL '77 commemorative plate.

Edited May 26, 2007 by smarter

[danteh1]

I got out in november of '80. Got home in time enough for Thanksgiving of that year.

I still miss some of the people that i knew that were still in at the time, don't know if that many are still in or not. I know that at least 1 or 2 atill are. But anywho, it's all water under the bridge I guess. I'm just glad to be out. i still am in comunication with a good friend that took the PFAL class when I did in the service back in '74, we talk from time to time and remember what good times we did have.

But on the "Takit" band, I did have an artical from the Omaha World Herald newspaper at one time about when 'takit' came to Omaha. There was a write up about the band and who they were with and all. Also in the artical, I wish that i still had it, was a note about TWI not paying all of the costs and bills of using the Omaha Civic Auditorium for the production. Guess that goes along with what TWI stands for 'get as much money as you can and leave the rest hanging and run like 7734'.

Edited May 26, 2007 by danteh1

[Eagle]

Left November 1, 1992. Exactly. Got TOO Weird.

[socks]

I left in '86.

A point of historical clarification :

"Takit" - the last year Joyful Noise was on the road, we were doing the second year of the Take a Stand caravan. It still had life in it but was getting routine, to a certain extent. The years up to an including that one were some of the most exciting and rewarding years of my life. But then I was young, and that was the life I was living. :) One conversation we had on "the bus" early that year was with Vince and the rest of us, and we were all realizing I think how routine the ministry had become. Things seemed to be happening by rote, expectations were spelled out and everyone was going on their merry way in what was starting to look a lot like what everyone said they didn't want - "church", at it's worst.

Most of us had come into the ministry through music, back "in the day" of the late '60's, some of us had come from active careers as musicians of various stripe. We'd seen the initial growth of the Way as something we'd grown up into and through. It had been a "youth" explosion but one that if you were part you lived through, rather than observed. So, looking back we were pondering where we'd come from, where we were and where we were going.

One of the things I remember Vince saying that clarified it perfectly was describing how Way fellowships had become. "Is this what's going to happen for the rest of my life, every week I go over to your house and drink coffee and eat cookies, sing some songs, read the bible? Is that it?" and he threw some cookies over the table, which started a minor food fight.

The Take a Stand Caravans had started by "accident", and were the result of different things we'd been doing. At one point we realized that we wanted to go out, hit the road and "do something", not sit around doing the same old thing. Try some ideas out, get face to face with people. So the "TASC"s formed out of that.

During that year we had a lot of conversations about what to do next, musically. Back on the bus, we talked about how ideas got into the mainstream of culture and were popularized into language, words and terms. Vince was going on about "taking it to the top", trying to excel, "be your best". Not just taking what "the world" dished out, daring to be different, claiming your own vision and 'taking it". What would that look like musically, what kind of music could be done behind that, "taking it".

Brian B threw out the name "Take It" - he said "You keep saying take it, taking it to the top. Why not call the band "Take It".

Everyone riffed on that for awhile and it got stored away. Names were thrown around, who, what, where, when and it began to take form.

Takit is a whole nother story in and of itself. I think music was sort of in the Way's genes, given how the ministry had grown from the culture of the 60's and all of the people of that era. Buuuuut - at the time it happened it was "real", a product of the people and who they were. Over time we all change, and our culture grows around us, with us, in us.

A very small percentage of the ideas and vision that was abounding in so many people at that time ever got going, or off the ground. Politics prevailed, in the end. But there were some very good people and some very interesting things that did poke through.

[dmiller]

Hey Socks ---

Did you come to Duluth Minney-soda in 1978 with Joyful Noise??

Joyful Noise showed up here, and played a gig at The Uncle Harry Coffeehouse ---

(Which was an old church owned by Gene and Debbie Ne$g0da).

Jest curious. ;)

[gladtobeout]

My husband and I left in 1989 after we got Loy's ranting (10:30 morning fellowship.) He had just fired our local leadership for absolutely no good reason.

Edited May 30, 2007 by gladtobeout

[Al Poole]

October '86. Perfect time to leave. SO much confusion. No one EVER called or hassled us in any way whatsoever. We told the leadership we wanted "no assignment" the previous spring, moved to new city, said hello to local "leadership," went to all of 2 "meetings" then just never went back!! The funny thing was my wife at the time worked wih the "branch" leaders wife!!