It's hard to believe I still remember the corpse objectives,or principals,or whatever they were called....You are referring to #3...."Physical training,making your physical body,the vehical of communication of the Word,as vital as possible"...
I don't think in and of itself,it was a bad objective,really...."Believing" is only mentioned in objective #4 "Practice believing,to bring material abundance to you and the ministry",although it was certainly used to get folks to push their physical limitations...
There was a phrase tossed around quite often in those days...something like "run with reckless abandon"....We applied it in lots of situations...probably in many we should not have....I took it to mean that I shouldn't worry about negative consequences when I "walked out on my believing"....
Weren't the Corps Principals on our graduation certificate?
I think I had it on my wall after I graduated but I felt like sh1t every time I looked at it, because I always felt like I couldn't live up to those "principals." I felt so condemned just looking at it.
I was 5th corps and as I recall the principals were there when we got there. Don't know if they had changed before that.
At that time it just meant running and eating well. We studied the Aerobics book by Kenneth Cooper that had just come out. There was talk and some action about trying to eat natural foods. And there was talk but very little action about getting people to quit smoking.
The tie-in between physical and spirituality was not a big deal. And, of course nobody had the brains (or guts) to say "Hey! that's putting my body in harm's way - it violates a corps principal."
Were the "corps principles" apart of the program from the start or were they revamped over time?
The reson I am bringing this up is all the talk of risk that has been going on. One of the corps principles was about your body being a vehicle of righteousness or some sh!t like that. It seems that TWI put some sort of equation together involving physical ability and believing equaling spiritual pumpatude.
(snip)
I know VP wanted the Corps to be like the mArine Corps, but those people are trained physically and mentally. In the corps you were just thrown into situaltions without appropriate technical and physical training. You were told the magic of believing (as Satori put it) was the key to all your mental, physical and spiritual obsticles.
In the tape series "the Heart of the Way Corps", vpw was rather
specific that HE came up with the 5 "spiritual principles" in a few
minutes. So, that WAS from the beginning of the program.
There were minor changes. The first one read
"Acquire an in-depth spiritual perception and awareness."
He complained that it ORIGINALLY said "of The Word".
Frankly, I don't get what he complained about-it was always part of
his nebulous claims that he operated on some sort of spiritual
plateau where that's what HE did. Maybe he didn't like the
competition, and preferred that the rank-and-file remained spiritually
dependent upon him and not make God their sufficiency in revelation.
====
The complaint you raised is one I've been mentioning also-
the way corpse was organized SPECIFICALLY to throw people into
situations where they had inadequate or absent training,
and were supervised by people with inadequate or absent training,
and blame the victims when things didn't go perfectly.
Mind you, the victims were told before going in that it was the most
fantastic "training" in the world (what "training"?)
but they were NOT told ahead of time that they would face
physically-demanding, emotionally-assaulting headgames, and that
some of them would lose their lives due to the careless planning
that was fudged from the top on down.
Of course, someone here says that the responsibility was all on the
people who signed, and on the inadequately-trained facilitators,
who were given a candybar and a map and told to make it across the
Here were the wc principles from early 2004 - these are reworded from the extremely verbose ones that craig came up with. I think I have those somewhere too, but I'll have to look:
1. Acquire and enhance your in-depth spiritual perception to a thorough awareness of God's Word as it applies to various life situations.
2. Receive and exercise training in the whole Word of God, doctrinally and practically, so as to be able to teach others.
3. Utilize physical discipline making your physical body, the "vehicle" of communication of the Word, as vital as possible.
4. Believe faithfully to live abundantly on a genuine need basis and to bring physical and material abundance to God's household of The Way Ministry at all levels.
5. Go forth as overseers and laborers in areas of earnest desire, need and humility in the household to bring discipleship and thus the prevailing Word into energized reality to the world.
quote:4. Believe faithfully to live abundantly on a genuine need basis and to bring physical and material abundance to God's household of The Way Ministry at all levels.
1 - so you are to have spiritual perception, but not required to do anything about it. That's pretty much what they do. I guess that one's right.
2 - Learn TWIt doctine so that you can teach it to others. Just teach the doctrine, no need to actually apply it practically or help people in other ways.
3 - Don't smoke, don't drink, what do you do? Even though you only make peanuts and we don't even give you time to sleep, we want you out there exercising and staying in shape so we don't have to be bothered with you getting sick. (We'll just say you're lying about it anyway)
4 - Live abundantly on a need basis? Isn't that an oxymoron? You'll be happy with what we give you - and if you're not full time staff - you better make a good living and keep brining in the booty for us at HQ. Any wc you know living abundantly?? I don't know any who aren't full time.
5 - Oversee - they do that very well. Laborers? I don't know any wc who do anything besides delegate. If they get their hands into areas of desire or need it's just to tell people that things would be so much better for them if they would "believe" or if they knew more of "the Word." God forbid you should actually help someone!
I don't see anything in here about loving, caring for or building up God's people. --> I don't see any real Christian principles here. All it looks like to me is ways TWI expects the wc to continue to prosper TWI.
Good for you,Shaz....You should have been ordained...you even spelled vehicle correctly...I'll have to brush up on my scrabblegrams....
You know,I would be interested to know what the corpse trainers,or the students for that matter,had in mind regarding objective #1 "Acquire an in-depth spiritual perception and awareness"...It seemed like I got a D- or an F+ in that category...I fully expected that to mean how to get more revelation,that God's "still small voice" would be clearer to me than anything my own reason would tell me...
I would say the corpse program only delivered on the last four of the five objectives...It was as if you were kept busy "studying the word",physically training,practicing believing(yeah,right) and going forth as a worker,but what about the "in-depth spiritual perception and awareness"?....Don't worry,that will come later...just keep doing the other four...
In a sense,I think that was the most deceptive part of the program...Somehow,by doing all these physical things,we could learn to "reach up into Daddy's cookie jar" and come down with a cookie...I guess I never quite learned how to reach..
Just what does it mean to be "spiritually aware"?...Count the devils when you walk into a room?....Or if it's messy,percieve that it's spiritually 'dark"?...Maybe you don't buy that Ford Pinto because God(and Ralph Nader) calls it the "barbecue that seats four"...And what is spiritually perceptive?...Lessee,this guy shows up drunk every night,so he must have the spirit of leviathon,or whatever it's called...What to do?...I don't want to preach on the negatives of drinking,he may tell me more about alcoholism than I'll ever know...Should I "minister" to him?....Nope....No revelation...
I thought I might even be called on to "please stand and bring forth a word of knowledge"...I guess that 'magic' of spiritual perception and awareness was something I was looking for,and the way corpse offered it and nobody else did...
I always thought of the "spiritual perception and awareness" thing as being a combination of receiving lots of revelation and of really "knowing the score" about how devil spirits are working behind the scenes of everything.
'Course, you are talking to the gal who was married to an alcoholic and driving a Pinto right after getting out of the Corps, so I guess I flunked Principle "1!
That's the first time I've seen the Corps principles listed in a long, long time.
I know that there were other teachings on the subject, but I look at those principles in light of true Christian service and am absolutely amazed at the difference in emphasis.
All throughout history, the examples of great men of God were those who abandoned all to serve God and His people. So many examples of people who gave it ALL up to do so. Look at all of the martyrs in the Bible. Look at all of the martyrs in the 2,000 years since the Bible was written. People who have voluntarily given up wealth, health and everything else with their eyes only on God. But that's not Way Corps.
I look at these principles and think that I used to aspire to live them. But I look now at them and wonder what I was thinking? I now look back on them and think what an ego trip.
It seems like the emphasis is on making a set of super-believers rather than training servants for God's people. Its no wonder to me that so many in the Corps turned into a bunch of arrogant mini-MOGs hell-bent on controlling others rather than delivering others. Yup, no surprise at all.
quote: You know,I would be interested to know what the corpse trainers,or the students for that matter,had in mind regarding objective #1 "Acquire an in-depth spiritual perception and awareness"...
John Hendricks, who replaced BM as overseer at Rome City, did a teaching on CP1 back in '86 or so. His take was that just making it into residence didn't automatically mean that you HAD spiritual perception and awareness. It was a confrontational teaching, I suppose, intended mainly for in residence corps. He said that anybody who didn't genuinely want to help people (look at me I'm corps kiss my a**) wasn't going to ever GET a spiritual perception and awareness.
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excathedra
i think it was to make your body, the vehicle of communication of the word, as vital as possible
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simonzelotes
It's hard to believe I still remember the corpse objectives,or principals,or whatever they were called....You are referring to #3...."Physical training,making your physical body,the vehical of communication of the Word,as vital as possible"...
I don't think in and of itself,it was a bad objective,really...."Believing" is only mentioned in objective #4 "Practice believing,to bring material abundance to you and the ministry",although it was certainly used to get folks to push their physical limitations...
There was a phrase tossed around quite often in those days...something like "run with reckless abandon"....We applied it in lots of situations...probably in many we should not have....I took it to mean that I shouldn't worry about negative consequences when I "walked out on my believing"....
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excathedra
hi simon
that one sounds funny to me now, practice believing for money for you and the ministry
although i wish i had more
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simonzelotes
Excie interpreted that objective as "A case of oil,making your '65 Impala,the vehical of communication of the Word,as vital as possible"...
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excathedra
LMAO
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outandabout
Weren't the Corps Principals on our graduation certificate?
I think I had it on my wall after I graduated but I felt like sh1t every time I looked at it, because I always felt like I couldn't live up to those "principals." I felt so condemned just looking at it.
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Steve!
Didn't loyboy stinkendale revamp them to make them 100 times more verbose? just like everything else?
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outandabout
So I heard.
But I can't even remember the first ones....
Not ivory towers...no that's not it....Not fashioned like ivory towers, minds that .....
run like the wind, practice believing to bring physical abundance to you and the ministry....that I recall because somebody already said it. oh well
I don't even know where that diploma/certificate is. Hmmmm maybe it's in the trunk too where I found the Corps Wk picture.
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My3Cents
I was 5th corps and as I recall the principals were there when we got there. Don't know if they had changed before that.
At that time it just meant running and eating well. We studied the Aerobics book by Kenneth Cooper that had just come out. There was talk and some action about trying to eat natural foods. And there was talk but very little action about getting people to quit smoking.
The tie-in between physical and spirituality was not a big deal. And, of course nobody had the brains (or guts) to say "Hey! that's putting my body in harm's way - it violates a corps principal."
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Steve!
Weren't the memory pegs something like:
1-run
2-zoo
3-scream
or something like that?
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WordWolf
In the tape series "the Heart of the Way Corps", vpw was rather
specific that HE came up with the 5 "spiritual principles" in a few
minutes. So, that WAS from the beginning of the program.
There were minor changes. The first one read
"Acquire an in-depth spiritual perception and awareness."
He complained that it ORIGINALLY said "of The Word".
Frankly, I don't get what he complained about-it was always part of
his nebulous claims that he operated on some sort of spiritual
plateau where that's what HE did. Maybe he didn't like the
competition, and preferred that the rank-and-file remained spiritually
dependent upon him and not make God their sufficiency in revelation.
====
The complaint you raised is one I've been mentioning also-
the way corpse was organized SPECIFICALLY to throw people into
situations where they had inadequate or absent training,
and were supervised by people with inadequate or absent training,
and blame the victims when things didn't go perfectly.
Mind you, the victims were told before going in that it was the most
fantastic "training" in the world (what "training"?)
but they were NOT told ahead of time that they would face
physically-demanding, emotionally-assaulting headgames, and that
some of them would lose their lives due to the careless planning
that was fudged from the top on down.
Of course, someone here says that the responsibility was all on the
people who signed, and on the inadequately-trained facilitators,
who were given a candybar and a map and told to make it across the
state, or something.
So, there's a difference of opinion.
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Belle
Here were the wc principles from early 2004 - these are reworded from the extremely verbose ones that craig came up with. I think I have those somewhere too, but I'll have to look:
1. Acquire and enhance your in-depth spiritual perception to a thorough awareness of God's Word as it applies to various life situations.
2. Receive and exercise training in the whole Word of God, doctrinally and practically, so as to be able to teach others.
3. Utilize physical discipline making your physical body, the "vehicle" of communication of the Word, as vital as possible.
4. Believe faithfully to live abundantly on a genuine need basis and to bring physical and material abundance to God's household of The Way Ministry at all levels.
5. Go forth as overseers and laborers in areas of earnest desire, need and humility in the household to bring discipleship and thus the prevailing Word into energized reality to the world.
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excathedra
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Belle
1 - so you are to have spiritual perception, but not required to do anything about it. That's pretty much what they do. I guess that one's right.
2 - Learn TWIt doctine so that you can teach it to others. Just teach the doctrine, no need to actually apply it practically or help people in other ways.
3 - Don't smoke, don't drink, what do you do? Even though you only make peanuts and we don't even give you time to sleep, we want you out there exercising and staying in shape so we don't have to be bothered with you getting sick. (We'll just say you're lying about it anyway)
4 - Live abundantly on a need basis? Isn't that an oxymoron? You'll be happy with what we give you - and if you're not full time staff - you better make a good living and keep brining in the booty for us at HQ. Any wc you know living abundantly?? I don't know any who aren't full time.
5 - Oversee - they do that very well. Laborers? I don't know any wc who do anything besides delegate. If they get their hands into areas of desire or need it's just to tell people that things would be so much better for them if they would "believe" or if they knew more of "the Word." God forbid you should actually help someone!
I don't see anything in here about loving, caring for or building up God's people.
--> I don't see any real Christian principles here. All it looks like to me is ways TWI expects the wc to continue to prosper TWI.
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shazdancer
Compare the lengthier version on Belle's list with these, VPW's list:
1. Acquire an in-depth spiritual perception and awareness.
2. Receive training in the whole Word so as to be able to teach others.
3. Physical training, making your physical body the vehicle of communication of the Word as vital as possible.
4. Practice believing to bring material abundance to you and the ministry.
5. Go forth as leaders and workers in areas of concern, interest and need.
Can't believe I can still come up with them verbatim, 25 years later. Done from memory, but checked for accuracy,
Shaz
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simonzelotes
Good for you,Shaz....You should have been ordained...you even spelled vehicle correctly...I'll have to brush up on my scrabblegrams....
You know,I would be interested to know what the corpse trainers,or the students for that matter,had in mind regarding objective #1 "Acquire an in-depth spiritual perception and awareness"...It seemed like I got a D- or an F+ in that category...I fully expected that to mean how to get more revelation,that God's "still small voice" would be clearer to me than anything my own reason would tell me...
I would say the corpse program only delivered on the last four of the five objectives...It was as if you were kept busy "studying the word",physically training,practicing believing(yeah,right) and going forth as a worker,but what about the "in-depth spiritual perception and awareness"?....Don't worry,that will come later...just keep doing the other four...
In a sense,I think that was the most deceptive part of the program...Somehow,by doing all these physical things,we could learn to "reach up into Daddy's cookie jar" and come down with a cookie...I guess I never quite learned how to reach..
Just what does it mean to be "spiritually aware"?...Count the devils when you walk into a room?....Or if it's messy,percieve that it's spiritually 'dark"?...Maybe you don't buy that Ford Pinto because God(and Ralph Nader) calls it the "barbecue that seats four"...And what is spiritually perceptive?...Lessee,this guy shows up drunk every night,so he must have the spirit of leviathon,or whatever it's called...What to do?...I don't want to preach on the negatives of drinking,he may tell me more about alcoholism than I'll ever know...Should I "minister" to him?....Nope....No revelation...
I thought I might even be called on to "please stand and bring forth a word of knowledge"...I guess that 'magic' of spiritual perception and awareness was something I was looking for,and the way corpse offered it and nobody else did...
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shazdancer
Dear simon,
I always thought of the "spiritual perception and awareness" thing as being a combination of receiving lots of revelation and of really "knowing the score" about how devil spirits are working behind the scenes of everything.
'Course, you are talking to the gal who was married to an alcoholic and driving a Pinto right after getting out of the Corps, so I guess I flunked Principle "1!
Shaz
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simonzelotes
Or you shoulda gotten a Corvair...Oh,wait,Nader(I mean,God) didn't like those,either...
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jardinero
Not that I ever noticed it much when I was in, but it's very interesting to me now that none of them say anything like
"leading others to a knowledge of Jesus
Christ" ......
Come on, everyone sing along now:
"Open my eyes that I may see...
Glimpses of truth Thou hast for me..."
J.
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markomalley
That's the first time I've seen the Corps principles listed in a long, long time.
I know that there were other teachings on the subject, but I look at those principles in light of true Christian service and am absolutely amazed at the difference in emphasis.
All throughout history, the examples of great men of God were those who abandoned all to serve God and His people. So many examples of people who gave it ALL up to do so. Look at all of the martyrs in the Bible. Look at all of the martyrs in the 2,000 years since the Bible was written. People who have voluntarily given up wealth, health and everything else with their eyes only on God. But that's not Way Corps.
I look at these principles and think that I used to aspire to live them. But I look now at them and wonder what I was thinking? I now look back on them and think what an ego trip.
It seems like the emphasis is on making a set of super-believers rather than training servants for God's people. Its no wonder to me that so many in the Corps turned into a bunch of arrogant mini-MOGs hell-bent on controlling others rather than delivering others. Yup, no surprise at all.
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johniam
quote: You know,I would be interested to know what the corpse trainers,or the students for that matter,had in mind regarding objective #1 "Acquire an in-depth spiritual perception and awareness"...
John Hendricks, who replaced BM as overseer at Rome City, did a teaching on CP1 back in '86 or so. His take was that just making it into residence didn't automatically mean that you HAD spiritual perception and awareness. It was a confrontational teaching, I suppose, intended mainly for in residence corps. He said that anybody who didn't genuinely want to help people (look at me I'm corps kiss my a**) wasn't going to ever GET a spiritual perception and awareness.
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