I'm in the zoo. I'm walking through at my own pace and you guys are the animals snarling at us from your cages. Very entertaining. But I'm free and you guys are in cages. Enjoy.
I'm in the zoo. I'm walking through at my own pace and you guys are the animals snarling at us from your cages. Very entertaining. But I'm free and you guys are in cages. Enjoy.
You know John - I have tried to give you the benefit of the doubt here. I still remember our conversations on other topics, where you tried to help me with something I was trying to figure out.
but 90% of what comes out of your keyboard on these forums is just vile and nasty. It is hard for me to reconcile the two, but after a while, I think I would be stupid to think the 10% revealed more about you than the 90% does.
I'm in the zoo. I'm walking through at my own pace and you guys are the animals snarling at us from your cages. Very entertaining. But I'm free and you guys are in cages. Enjoy.
None of us are free
If one of us is chained
None of us are free--------------------(Nann, Weil, Russell)
I'm in the zoo. I'm walking through at my own pace and you guys are the animals snarling at us from your cages. Very entertaining. But I'm free and you guys are in cages. Enjoy.
Nice variation on the ad hominem attack!
Edited by Oakspear
With this intro, the rest of the teaching illustrated each option by seeing what Jesus did. In Luke 15 and Luke 16 from verse 14 to the end show him answering fools according to their folly. John 8:13-59, Matt. 23, and Mark 12:12-34 show him not answering fools according to their folly. He wasn't afraid to offend people, especially when under attack. He said some very "hard hearted, unloving" things to some people in the verses mentioned. Just for the record.
Yes, Jesus said some very "hard hearted, unloving" things to the Pharassees who were hard hearted and unloving. To the poor, the wounded, those who suffered - he was gentle and kind.
Weren`t all of the hard hearted things that Jesus was ever quoted as saying directed at the pharicees and saducees that hurt God`s people, the money changers who made money off of God`s people???
I think that you are right Abi, He was compassionate and kind to most everybody else...
Quit wasting your time guys. All they want to do is bait people. Their god and ours is not the same. They both speak of worshipping god, but in their own delusions their god is a man buried under a fountain in ohio.. Any point you make/prove with them only leads to personal attacks. They just cannot admit that they have been wrong or that they care. To do so would be devastating.
So what? He wasn't one of the first to put anything together in a coherent package, his "package" was largely Leonard's class with Wierwille's name stamped on it.
You don't care that "the man of God" stole his centerpiece class?
Of all the negative things people have said about VP (VP actually was his actual nickname, people who knew him from his youth called him VP) the most interesting one to me is the plaguristm he "stole" stuff from everybody else & slapped his name on it as if it were his own.
Why do I say that?
Seeing as I worked in the Way Publications dept basically from August '78 until Aug. '88 (with a couple of leaves to go through TWC) and I never ONCE heard that accusation... It is most interesting to me. Especially seeing as every word we published had to be cleared, ad nauseum, by the legal dept. before we could put anything into print.
I remember legal going over PFAL and editing the class materials "for legal reasons." The legal dept. had ultimate power over ANY deadline or publication date and they wielded it, as I said, regardless to the complaints of ANYBODY.
I actually learned of the thefts of info here at the cafe. I also distinctly remember VP (again ad nauseum) talking about people he learned stuff from.
I'm not speaking in VP's defense, just recounting my experience on the topic. There are copyright laws, we all know, and we also are aware of the major scrutiny on VP and TWI through the '80's from lots on "big name folk."
TWI, during that same stretch made it to #2 on the most dangerous cult list. Still, no outcry about him having stole "all of his stuff."
Veddy interesting to me.
In terms of "good things we might remember...."
I remember one critic, during his ripping TWI on the cult tip, saying that the book Recieving The Holy Spirit Today was one of the difinitive works on the subject.
Again, not to defend VP, but he was a "complier" more than an originator.
Remember the nationally published article, "The Groovy Christians of Rye New York" ???
VP was on the cover of (I think it was) Parade Magazine as a new kind of preacher who was reaching out, successfully, to young people and bringing them back to the church. This was around 1971, when through the '60's teens vitually disappeared from the church in the US. TWI was at the forefront of changing the landscape of how organized christianity does things.
Agai, not the only one but we were a major player in maikng it cool to go to church. Pretty much "nobody" in the church was using rock & rool style bands to do worship music back then.
Also. The Way Magazine was a trendsetter, pushing the idea that "the church" could have slick magazines that rivaled newstand type publications.
The church in the home concept was pretty much not happening back then when TWI started doing it.
VP did a lot of things good. People have a really hard time getting past the bad stiff he did though. Even though men who were undeniable counted as "great men" did much worse than he, there is still a lot of anger floatin' around concerniing him.
Actually HCW, I beg to differ with you a bit as I was a "groovy Christian of Rye" and was at the fellowship when the Life photograher came to it and took the pics.
The Way East was Steve Heefner's ministry. VP came to visit twice, between '70 and '71. Had an evening fellowship at Tim Bishop's house. I was at both of them. I know he made another visit later, after I had left NY.
Heefner had been apart of the early Jesus Movement in CA with Jim Doop, Ted Wise, Chuck Martin and Lonnie Frisbee.
Jim Dopp told me, in one of our incredible phone conversations about 2 months before he died, that when VP came to SF, he gathered those 5 men together and played the class for them. Wise, Martin and Frisbee said, see ya later after a couple of sessions. They would not work with him or become a part of his ministry. Heefner and Dopp finished, and were invited to HQ for the summer.
They are the ones who won the people and ran the classes, and as it grew, let other high school kids run the class in their home (via audio) for all their friends.
But, Heefner was in daily contact with everyone, their home was open to all, they were the overseers.
The work done in CA and NY was done by Dopp and Heefner.
The Heefners were an amazing couple. It was the book of Acts. Thousands of us teen got born again under their ministry.
To us kids, VP and HQ, was this etherial place, out there somewhere in the middle of the country, sure, he came to see us, he had this awesome class (well, to our young minds at the time) but it wasn't at all about him. Our beloved leadership, the ones with the ministry to the kids, were the Heefners.
I think, without the Rock to get the kids out to HQ, hardly anyone would have made the trek.
VP sat back, watched it grow and after a couple of years, when it was big enough and he had some yes men who could take over, went out to CA and did the coup. Grabbed the Way West out from Dopp, and did the same with Heefner in the Way East. The Way East and the Way West became the Way and Moynihan took over in the east in NY.
So, I really can't credit VP with doing too much work at all in the beginning. Once it got rolling, and his ducks were lined up, he stepped in and took over.
I guess my point is, VP wasn't a trendsetter.
This type of fellowship had been going on in California for a few years since the midd '60s, spread up the west coast, has heading to the midwest and hit the east coast. VP had nothing to do with it.
I will say though, yes, the Magazine was definitely a good one.
I think, since many of the media people in the NYC area live in the suburbs (its amazing the kids I went to school with, what their parents did - everyone thinks famous people in the arts, finance and media live in the City - they don't, they're in the suburbs) and their kids and kids friends were getting into TWI, someone at Life said, what's going on with our kids - go check this out. They obviously had contacted VP, because he was ready for his photo ops.
Actually HCW, I beg to differ with you a bit as I was a "groovy Christian of Rye" and was at the fellowship when the Life photograher came to it and took the pics.
The Way East was Steve Heefner's ministry.... Heefner had been apart of the early Jesus Movement in CA with Jim Doop, Ted Wise, Chuck Martin and Lonnie Frisbee.
Heefner and Dopp finished, and were invited to HQ for the summer.
They are the ones who won the people and ran the classes, and as it grew, let other high school kids run the class in their home (via audio) for all their friends....
But, Heefner was in daily contact with everyone, their home was open to all, they were the overseers.
The work done in CA and NY was done by Dopp and Heefner.
The Heefners were an amazing couple. It was the book of Acts. Thousands of us teen got born again under their ministry....
So, I really can't credit VP with doing too much work at all in the beginning. Once it got rolling, and his ducks were lined up, he stepped in and took over....
I guess my point is, VP wasn't a trendsetter.
They obviously had contacted VP, because he was ready for his photo ops.
Thanks Sunesis.
Isn't that how it "always" is?
"Leaders" are always the figurehead when it is actually the rank & file people who actually do the work, then the "leader" gets the credit.
It wasn't my intent to say that it was VP who did the work in Rye. Nor was it my intent to say that it was VP's idea to get young people to come back to church. The youth movement started on the coasts, the article, the mag w/VP's smilin' face on the cover helped to bring national focus to what you guys were doing. VP parlayed the attention into becoming a part of the short list of every major christian leader's "top cult leaders."
VP originally started The Way in Ohio, as the Chimes Hour Youth Caravan. Besides the young people in the choral group, The Way was no different than any other church a bunch of old folk doing things the old way.
Your detail helps illustrate my basic position on TWI and speaks to the question about good stuff in TWI. Only you guys who were involved know the whole story about the old days of TWI. Being @ HQ we only got VP's side of what went on.
You're helping to bring out the point that TWI was made up of many, many, many people's individual ministries. It was we, all of us who did the work and VP who, by mostly falling into it became this MOG figure at the "top" of the ministry. Looking back literally all of us in every category have stories of VP's heavy handed tactics in dealing w/ us to get what he wanted.
It wasn't limited to the much spoken of sex thing, it was pervasive. Yes he could be kind, gentle and altogether wonderful but he was always equally horrible, often within the same few minutes of an encounter.
I used to subscribe to the thinking:
VPW, in the good ol days of the ministry = TWI was good
LCM, in the really horrible, post VPW era = TWI became bad - really bad
Rosalie, in the now = TWI irrecoverably and wholly decietfully bad.
BUT. After distancing myself from TWI and then looking back on it. With thte help of info like you've suppled Sunesis I see that VPW - built the monster that TWI is. There was always a measure of VPW = BAD in TWI. However there were a lot of wonderful people in TWI who do a LOT of great things leading people to believe that TWI was good. VP had the Dr. Jeckyl/ Mr. Hyde thing going on from the beginning and throughout his tenure in TWI.
In the real world, the leader is the figurehead who gets the credit for the work of the troops. BUT he also is the one who gets fired when the organization fails.
We can't blame LCM completely for the monster he was. VPW in many ways CREATED the monster LCM was by the monster he, VPW modeled for LCM.
Had VP stood up and yelled against the whole sex thing in the ministry it could have been snuffed out like a small campfire. VP was legendary for "melting faces." HE could have simply said something like:
"Keep your freakin' dicks in your pants! And you girls keep your legs closed!"
People would have done it. People would have repeated it. People would have stood around under the streetlight late at night during ROA seeing who could do the best rendition of VP - - same as we did with the other things he said.
As far as trendsetting goes, VP had some good ideas through the years, but it was the PEOPLE who did the trendsetting.
Bill Gates doesn't do more than a small fraction of the work at Microsoft. Whereas he, as the leader, gets the photo ops, news conferences, does the public speaking and is the richest man in the world. Literally EVERYONE who was there, in their "good ol days" is also rich beyond most of our imaginations.
Bill Gates figured a way to share the wealth from his ideas. VP figured a way to be king & keep the wealth. Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't a big part of the issue with people in the way east & the way west the fact that VP demanded that they take offerings and send the $$$ to HQ?
Hi HCW! I think we're on the same page here. I still remember you from HQ - we must do lunch someday!
From what Jim told me, The Way West and The Way East were each their own separate entities. The agreement they made with VP was the money from the classes and ABS was to be used to for the work of the ministry in their own areas, for what was needed in NY or CA. What was left over was then sent to HQ.
Yes, that was the meeting in CA when VP told them from now on, the money comes directly to HQ, and we will distribute it as we see fit, and The Way West and the Way East were dissolved and were now part of the Way.
It was a massive betrayal, Jim felt. He felt terribly used.
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johniam
I'm in the zoo. I'm walking through at my own pace and you guys are the animals snarling at us from your cages. Very entertaining. But I'm free and you guys are in cages. Enjoy.
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Abigail
You know John - I have tried to give you the benefit of the doubt here. I still remember our conversations on other topics, where you tried to help me with something I was trying to figure out.
but 90% of what comes out of your keyboard on these forums is just vile and nasty. It is hard for me to reconcile the two, but after a while, I think I would be stupid to think the 10% revealed more about you than the 90% does.
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waysider
None of us are free
If one of us is chained
None of us are free--------------------(Nann, Weil, Russell)
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Oakspear
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johniam
quote: None of us are free
If one of us is chained
None of us are free--------------------(Nann, Weil, Russell)
John 8:32 - and ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free...Jesus
Interesting that this verse is in the context of a heated discussion.
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Abigail
Yes, Jesus said some very "hard hearted, unloving" things to the Pharassees who were hard hearted and unloving. To the poor, the wounded, those who suffered - he was gentle and kind.
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rascal
Weren`t all of the hard hearted things that Jesus was ever quoted as saying directed at the pharicees and saducees that hurt God`s people, the money changers who made money off of God`s people???
I think that you are right Abi, He was compassionate and kind to most everybody else...
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Danny
John
Gentle and kind to your brothers and sisters
shows in your writing you have in my view
a lack.
Any yes I'm judging you. I believe I'm to weigh what you
say to what I believe to be true. Woman hater would be mild
you are a people hater.
Give me one place where you have Posted oh I'm sorry that happened to
you. No you come on here and say oh the great God PeePee never did that
and you are a lier.
I thank God for people like you. You give me a great example of someone
I never want to be.
Harsh yes I am. thanks.
God cries at some of the thinks yous say to your brothers and sisters.
More so to the sisters.
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way2much
Quit wasting your time guys. All they want to do is bait people. Their god and ours is not the same. They both speak of worshipping god, but in their own delusions their god is a man buried under a fountain in ohio.. Any point you make/prove with them only leads to personal attacks. They just cannot admit that they have been wrong or that they care. To do so would be devastating.
toodles
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rascal
Wrong thread.
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coolchef
man those two are wacko
but never the less
entertaning
gee where do the get thier thinking?
not from my bible
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waysider
To each his own
Said Farmer Jones
As he kissed Ol' Bossy the cow.
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HCW
Of all the negative things people have said about VP (VP actually was his actual nickname, people who knew him from his youth called him VP) the most interesting one to me is the plaguristm he "stole" stuff from everybody else & slapped his name on it as if it were his own.
Why do I say that?
Seeing as I worked in the Way Publications dept basically from August '78 until Aug. '88 (with a couple of leaves to go through TWC) and I never ONCE heard that accusation... It is most interesting to me. Especially seeing as every word we published had to be cleared, ad nauseum, by the legal dept. before we could put anything into print.
I remember legal going over PFAL and editing the class materials "for legal reasons." The legal dept. had ultimate power over ANY deadline or publication date and they wielded it, as I said, regardless to the complaints of ANYBODY.
I actually learned of the thefts of info here at the cafe. I also distinctly remember VP (again ad nauseum) talking about people he learned stuff from.
I'm not speaking in VP's defense, just recounting my experience on the topic. There are copyright laws, we all know, and we also are aware of the major scrutiny on VP and TWI through the '80's from lots on "big name folk."
TWI, during that same stretch made it to #2 on the most dangerous cult list. Still, no outcry about him having stole "all of his stuff."
Veddy interesting to me.
In terms of "good things we might remember...."
I remember one critic, during his ripping TWI on the cult tip, saying that the book Recieving The Holy Spirit Today was one of the difinitive works on the subject.
Again, not to defend VP, but he was a "complier" more than an originator.
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johniam
quote: Again, not to defend VP, but he was a "complier" more than an originator.
Sign of the times. Well, I liked his compilations.
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HCW
Remember the nationally published article, "The Groovy Christians of Rye New York" ???
VP was on the cover of (I think it was) Parade Magazine as a new kind of preacher who was reaching out, successfully, to young people and bringing them back to the church. This was around 1971, when through the '60's teens vitually disappeared from the church in the US. TWI was at the forefront of changing the landscape of how organized christianity does things.
Agai, not the only one but we were a major player in maikng it cool to go to church. Pretty much "nobody" in the church was using rock & rool style bands to do worship music back then.
Also. The Way Magazine was a trendsetter, pushing the idea that "the church" could have slick magazines that rivaled newstand type publications.
The church in the home concept was pretty much not happening back then when TWI started doing it.
VP did a lot of things good. People have a really hard time getting past the bad stiff he did though. Even though men who were undeniable counted as "great men" did much worse than he, there is still a lot of anger floatin' around concerniing him.
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Sunesis
Actually HCW, I beg to differ with you a bit as I was a "groovy Christian of Rye" and was at the fellowship when the Life photograher came to it and took the pics.
The Way East was Steve Heefner's ministry. VP came to visit twice, between '70 and '71. Had an evening fellowship at Tim Bishop's house. I was at both of them. I know he made another visit later, after I had left NY.
Heefner had been apart of the early Jesus Movement in CA with Jim Doop, Ted Wise, Chuck Martin and Lonnie Frisbee.
Jim Dopp told me, in one of our incredible phone conversations about 2 months before he died, that when VP came to SF, he gathered those 5 men together and played the class for them. Wise, Martin and Frisbee said, see ya later after a couple of sessions. They would not work with him or become a part of his ministry. Heefner and Dopp finished, and were invited to HQ for the summer.
They are the ones who won the people and ran the classes, and as it grew, let other high school kids run the class in their home (via audio) for all their friends.
But, Heefner was in daily contact with everyone, their home was open to all, they were the overseers.
The work done in CA and NY was done by Dopp and Heefner.
The Heefners were an amazing couple. It was the book of Acts. Thousands of us teen got born again under their ministry.
To us kids, VP and HQ, was this etherial place, out there somewhere in the middle of the country, sure, he came to see us, he had this awesome class (well, to our young minds at the time) but it wasn't at all about him. Our beloved leadership, the ones with the ministry to the kids, were the Heefners.
I think, without the Rock to get the kids out to HQ, hardly anyone would have made the trek.
VP sat back, watched it grow and after a couple of years, when it was big enough and he had some yes men who could take over, went out to CA and did the coup. Grabbed the Way West out from Dopp, and did the same with Heefner in the Way East. The Way East and the Way West became the Way and Moynihan took over in the east in NY.
So, I really can't credit VP with doing too much work at all in the beginning. Once it got rolling, and his ducks were lined up, he stepped in and took over.
I guess my point is, VP wasn't a trendsetter.
This type of fellowship had been going on in California for a few years since the midd '60s, spread up the west coast, has heading to the midwest and hit the east coast. VP had nothing to do with it.
I will say though, yes, the Magazine was definitely a good one.
I think, since many of the media people in the NYC area live in the suburbs (its amazing the kids I went to school with, what their parents did - everyone thinks famous people in the arts, finance and media live in the City - they don't, they're in the suburbs) and their kids and kids friends were getting into TWI, someone at Life said, what's going on with our kids - go check this out. They obviously had contacted VP, because he was ready for his photo ops.
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HCW
Thanks Sunesis.
Isn't that how it "always" is?
"Leaders" are always the figurehead when it is actually the rank & file people who actually do the work, then the "leader" gets the credit.
It wasn't my intent to say that it was VP who did the work in Rye. Nor was it my intent to say that it was VP's idea to get young people to come back to church. The youth movement started on the coasts, the article, the mag w/VP's smilin' face on the cover helped to bring national focus to what you guys were doing. VP parlayed the attention into becoming a part of the short list of every major christian leader's "top cult leaders."
VP originally started The Way in Ohio, as the Chimes Hour Youth Caravan. Besides the young people in the choral group, The Way was no different than any other church a bunch of old folk doing things the old way.
Your detail helps illustrate my basic position on TWI and speaks to the question about good stuff in TWI. Only you guys who were involved know the whole story about the old days of TWI. Being @ HQ we only got VP's side of what went on.
You're helping to bring out the point that TWI was made up of many, many, many people's individual ministries. It was we, all of us who did the work and VP who, by mostly falling into it became this MOG figure at the "top" of the ministry. Looking back literally all of us in every category have stories of VP's heavy handed tactics in dealing w/ us to get what he wanted.
It wasn't limited to the much spoken of sex thing, it was pervasive. Yes he could be kind, gentle and altogether wonderful but he was always equally horrible, often within the same few minutes of an encounter.
I used to subscribe to the thinking:
VPW, in the good ol days of the ministry = TWI was good
LCM, in the really horrible, post VPW era = TWI became bad - really bad
Rosalie, in the now = TWI irrecoverably and wholly decietfully bad.
BUT. After distancing myself from TWI and then looking back on it. With thte help of info like you've suppled Sunesis I see that VPW - built the monster that TWI is. There was always a measure of VPW = BAD in TWI. However there were a lot of wonderful people in TWI who do a LOT of great things leading people to believe that TWI was good. VP had the Dr. Jeckyl/ Mr. Hyde thing going on from the beginning and throughout his tenure in TWI.
In the real world, the leader is the figurehead who gets the credit for the work of the troops. BUT he also is the one who gets fired when the organization fails.
We can't blame LCM completely for the monster he was. VPW in many ways CREATED the monster LCM was by the monster he, VPW modeled for LCM.
Had VP stood up and yelled against the whole sex thing in the ministry it could have been snuffed out like a small campfire. VP was legendary for "melting faces." HE could have simply said something like:
"Keep your freakin' dicks in your pants! And you girls keep your legs closed!"
People would have done it. People would have repeated it. People would have stood around under the streetlight late at night during ROA seeing who could do the best rendition of VP - - same as we did with the other things he said.
As far as trendsetting goes, VP had some good ideas through the years, but it was the PEOPLE who did the trendsetting.
Bill Gates doesn't do more than a small fraction of the work at Microsoft. Whereas he, as the leader, gets the photo ops, news conferences, does the public speaking and is the richest man in the world. Literally EVERYONE who was there, in their "good ol days" is also rich beyond most of our imaginations.
Bill Gates figured a way to share the wealth from his ideas. VP figured a way to be king & keep the wealth. Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't a big part of the issue with people in the way east & the way west the fact that VP demanded that they take offerings and send the $$$ to HQ?
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Sunesis
Hi HCW! I think we're on the same page here. I still remember you from HQ - we must do lunch someday!
From what Jim told me, The Way West and The Way East were each their own separate entities. The agreement they made with VP was the money from the classes and ABS was to be used to for the work of the ministry in their own areas, for what was needed in NY or CA. What was left over was then sent to HQ.
Yes, that was the meeting in CA when VP told them from now on, the money comes directly to HQ, and we will distribute it as we see fit, and The Way West and the Way East were dissolved and were now part of the Way.
It was a massive betrayal, Jim felt. He felt terribly used.
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