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The Epistle of Chris Geer to the Americans: 1989


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I was glad to be a smoker then, as it gave me that moment to get up, kind of nod this way and that and work my way out of that hay baled sweltering humidified box of canvas tenting and get out to the muggy August air and share some healthy tobacco exhalant.

You crack me up, Socks. Makes me wish I had been a smoker. BUT the truth is I didn't even go inside the tent that year...played hookey. Was moving my Aramaic books out of the Research room and into my garage...got "reassigned" to Multi Services from the Research Dept. to wash cars, like the already clean car of a certain wife of a certain Pres. of dah wey.

So it goes. Glad it's gone. Those days are over. Now on to other projects like speaking up for freedom of expression. A constitutional "right" that wasn't honored at The Way. TWI was (still is) a sub-culture of repression in a county that allows such sub-cultures to repress, because even the likes of TWI is allowed freedom of expression. Ironic, isn't it? An uphill battle all the way...keep on speaking up. Maybe someone will hear...TWI is a group that suffocates individuals' efforts to express what they think and write what they want. It's a CLOSED system of absolutist ideology. Yes, that repression exists in Fundamentalist Christianity, not only in Fundamentalism of other religions.

Cheers,

Penworks

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True, out.

Nothing WAS ever specific.

Geer's entire premise for "what was wrong" was based on one thing - that Dr. Weirwille had told him he believed the Way BOT, Directors, Corps Directors, WOW staff, all of the Way leaders, Corps members and anyone else with a phone or mail box that he'd ever taught the Bible too had 1. forsaken him 2. sold out to the adversary in one way or another and 3. didn't care or want to listen to him.

That's not an exaggeration. That's the exact truth, as told to the Corps by Chris Geer.

It only took about a minute to say, at several points in his public speech to the corps that year at Corps Week, and then there was the endless drubbing of the POP reading itself. But that was the sum and substance of the only things he said 'were wrong" - specifically.

That Dr. Weirwille had been forsaken.

Everyone therefore needed to "come back to the Word" which meant to come back to some -

Very unclear

Form of acceptance and activity that would show us all to be back in the Saddle again.

It was bull - shi t.

There was a lot of talk about "Prayer" - prayer's always a good thing but that became the recourse for everyone's confusion. Pray because no one has any idea what else to do. Desparation, for many of the pray-ers.

Lots of talk about "believing" too - which didn't mean much to anyone who was already doing that to the best of their ability.

It was, by any bibilical standards, or just those old dirty regular run of the mill human standards - a completely stanky mess.

Bottom line though - it was a catalyst for change and that was a good thing - and could have been managed better and easier if anyone HAD REALLY WANTED to see change and progress at the Way. But none of them did once they got POP stuck up their butts, they were deathly afraid about what to do next. Funny - after all those years of pumping up their "believing" they caved at the first real challenge, which came from within their own ranks. Which in fact was something that VPW himself had identified while he was alive, would happen after he died...........so IMO the stew was brewing for a few years there, dissatisfaction, pride, envy, jealousy, greed - all the good ones were at work in that leadership group including Dr. Weirwille. Pride is the only real explanation for how a person of his history and investment would act in such a distorted way.

I've always said though - Craig wasn't exactly a chicken shi t, in his day back then - so Geer was carrying some SERIOUS HOODOO to scare him into submission so quickly, SERIOUS cha cha in his bag.

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Thanks, excie!

I remember how people said that the BOD hadn't "repented" or "gone back to the Word" or some such. I didn't know what they were talking about because no one would be specific.

No one would be specific because they were trying to keep the top leadership's sexual depredation under wraps. Truth about the adultery didn't start coming out until about a year after Geer read PoP on Corps night, and even then, that truth was not being communicated openly through the Way Tree channels. Leaders were being bribed or chucked right and left if they were even suspected of having an inkling of Schoenheit's paper.

I think Geer exercised such a seemingly weird power over the Trustees because they were afraid he would expose the adultery. I think there was an element of blackmail involved.

Love,

Steve

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1989 should have been the end of the end of TWI, rather than the beginning or the middle. Those of us who left recognized much of what was wrong. Those who stayed recognized the opportunistic insincerity of Geer and company. Too few, far too few, recognized that both sides were engaged in a hypocritical, vain, self-centered power play. No one was right about their allegiance. All were right about the unworthiness of the side they did not choose.

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I think Geer exercised such a seemingly weird power over the Trustees because they were afraid he would expose the adultery. I think there was an element of blackmail involved.

the only reason i have a hard time with this is because geer also could have been exposed for his adultery, but i don't think too many people knew about it

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In the Way we took years to do things others would have needed months to do.

Or weeks.

The "fixing" of the Way wasn't difficult. If the purpose was to get us all "back on the Word" - that's not a relative value. It's specific. And it's not a process, it's a state of mind.

"Believing" - the Way had taught that point for years. Instant clarity.

Once the Trustees "said" they accepted Geer's direction, that was really all you needed....

If that's all there was to it.

Geer had no interest in anything related to "adultery" other than he wanted it kept a non issue.

If the Trustees had trusted him and the others they'd been screwing around with, they'd have had no problem, they'd have been perfectly happy to keep on with what they were doing. They apparently were muttering on about how to manage the failed ministry that was failing because they would not do a few simple things and instead try to debate their positions with Geer. Who gave a crap? Not any of us. It would have been very simple for them to - in a word - suck it up and come open, clean and honest with everyone and literally, start over.

Over the years I've come to know the looks on their faces and their manner of behavior - it's simply fear. Deathly fear.

Under attack their character flaws provided the gaps for the fear of failure - which we'd dealt with so much bluster over the years and hours of teaching and blathering about conquering fear.....

To tear them down and apart.

What were they afraid of?

Everything they'd been doing that they knew was wrong - the money, the affairs, the nods and passes they'd given to people over the years and the condemnations they'd given to others for the very same offenses...

The unfairness, the greed, the pride. Building the campuses and staffing them for what - ?

I believe they'd talked themselves through all their bureaucratic crap for so many years until they finally realized - we're screwed. We're getting whacked by the very guy we 1. got everything from and then 2. pushed aside.

Like dominoes, it all fell - The "Passing of the Patriarch" reads like a Manual for Crafting Failure" - I'm sure Geer and others who live in that life stream still don't see that. But it's so clear reading it today, clearer than it was even then, hearing it for the first time - no matter how well intended or what excuses Geer made or would make today - it's a chronicle of the failure of the leadership of the ministry. Geer does point out quite clearly that the point of the "root" was to "feed" the tree - despite the fact that the use of the tree as a means of understanding the Way's ministry so clearly pointed out but ignored the true life of a growing tree - it's fruit. They insisted that the rotten "root" was tainting the entire "tree" - that's nothing more than being blinded to the vast strength that did exist in the ministry regardless of what these a-holes did or didn't do - the many people of the Way.

All the focus on Tom this and Bob that and Craig and Don and Howard - guess what guys, there were 1,000's of people who God loved, cared for and was working in reGARDless of what they did and who in both truth and fact could have been a source of strength and inspiration if even the slightest bit of concern had been shown for them.

Instead, they sat eating popcorn, sipping coffee and enjoying the transcontinental travel while they flushed their own futures down the toilet.

And they KNEW, the Bustees knew dammed well Geer wasn't going away quietly or quickly. Corps were taking sides, sending him money, buying into his tapes, mailings and anything else they could get.

The Big ShootOut at the OK Korral was fought with water guns.

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lovely post, mesocks

our loving father and his son our savior were left out of the epistle of 1989

Not just out of the epistle, excie...left out of TWI really.

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I would summarize thusly:

The environment of POP, the platform for the events as they occured, was VPW's ill health and death.

My opinion.

He had been ill, very sick and it was a battle for at least 4 years (that I was aware of, perhaps more). He was sick, he was seeing Doctors, he tried a nutritional approach, then he had the surgery on his eye, and more time after that fighting his illnesses.

He blamed his inability to both heal and die in a timely way (for Chissakes!) on the "unbelieving" of everyone else, mostly those closest to him like Don, Craig, Howard, and a few others. (Jaysus, he blamed so many people that worked right under his nose, so it's funny that all those years he himself was unable to keep mid level managers like Bob W and Tom whatsisnamewiththereadhair under control)

He got sick, very ill, he had surgery, his health continued to go up and down and ultimately his health failed.

The negative aspects of that are things many of us have or will deal with whether ourselves or others.

Way theology redefined "health" in such as way as to mean that "perfect" health was always available but not always "received" due to lack of believing, be it our own or even the believing of others around us.

Supportive believing feeds deliverance, negative feeds defeat is the basic flow of thought there.

Biblically we all know the same verses on all sides - I believe what VPW taught on this, to clarify this one point - that deliverance is a product of the deliverance of God. God asks that we trust Him, rely on Him. Our trust provides the perpective through which we have our relationship with God but whether we do or not has little to do with what God does or doesn't "do", rather our destinies are governed by God's grace, in the big picture....

Regardless how you slice it all though, all of us are going to die at some point, barring alternative intervention.

I think VPW acted like many people of his age and health at that time in their lives. He lashed out, blamed others, denied reality - he didn't like his condition - who would? Instead of chilling out and taking constructive measures to fix what he thought was wrong, he gave up - again, tired of the 'fight" with others. Given his lifetime of teaching all of us to "stand baby, no matter what anyone else does, you STAND, fight for the truth and the ministry that taught it to you babeee!"......

that's a little disappointing. It just is. He gave up and whined it out to Geer. In the end he was not that much different than anyone else, despite all the Word of God HE KNEW and was able to act upon.

And at the same time he had his three closest bud's ready to kick him to the curb so they could get on with the Ministry Business as they wanted to conduct it.

Talk about a flash of cold reality!

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dear wondeful stox i'll get to your last post a little later

in the meantime from your second to the last

Everything they'd been doing that they knew was wrong - the money, the affairs, the nods and passes they'd given to people over the years and the condemnations they'd given to others for the very same offenses...

that was a big one

ps. jenkinson :realmad:

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...snip...

I think VPW acted like many people of his age and health at that time in their lives. He lashed out, blamed others, denied reality - he didn't like his condition - who would? Instead of chilling out and taking constructive measures to fix what he thought was wrong, he gave up - again, tired of the 'fight" with others. Given his lifetime of teaching all of us to "stand baby, no matter what anyone else does, you STAND, fight for the truth and the ministry that taught it to you babeee!"......

that's a little disappointing. It just is. He gave up and whined it out to Geer. In the end he was not that much different than anyone else, despite all the Word of God HE KNEW and was able to act upon.

...snip...

How much of the Word of God DID Wierwille know? How much of the Word of God did Wierwille actually stand on? How much of the Word of God was Wierwille inclined to act upon?

Romans 12:9 says the love of God is without hypocrisy. Was Wierwille's attitude without hypocrisy?

When Martindale announced that all of the troubles of The Way International were the result of the slipshod way believers on the field were running Foundational PFAL, I knew that couldn't be right, so I started searching the Scriptures. What DOES the Word of God say?

Isaiah 9:16

"16 For the leaders of this people cause them to err; and they that are led of them are destroyed."

Jeremiah 23:14-16

"14 I have seen also in the prophets of Jerusalem an horrible thing: they commit adultery, and walk in lies: they strengthen also the hands of evildoers, and none doth return from his wickedness: they are all of them unto me as Sodom, and the inhabitants thereof as Gomorrah.

"15 Therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts concerning the prophets; Behold, I will feed them with wormwood, and make them drink the water of gall: for from the prophets of Jerusalem is profaneness [hypocrisy] gone forth into all the land.

"16 Thus saith the LORD of hosts, Hearken not unto the words of the prophets that prophesy unto you: they make you vain: they speak a vision out of their own heart, and not out of the mouth of the LORD."

Some people, Wierwille, Martindale, Geer, etc., placed very little weight on the adultery, but God, whose Word it is, places very MUCH weight on the adultery and the hypocrisy that is bred of it!

The leaders, specifically Wierwille and Martindale, caused the people to err. They are the ones who were responsible for the devastation and disappointment and misery that swept through the followers of the Way International, because of Wierwille's adultery and hypocrisy.

The law of believing, that Wierwille made so much of, was a vision out of his own heart, and not out of the mouth of the LORD.

The Way International could never live up to the ideal image so many of us wanted to bring to pass, because it was shot through to its heart with Wierwille's hypocrisy.

Love,

Steve

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  • 1 year later...

Bump....

First time I've read this thread. Socks makes many good points in his posts in this thread.

All the kerfuffle that Geer injected with his arrogant poop-paper was a smoke screen and power-grab.

I, for one, believe that clergy/corps/others were starting to sniff the sin, lust and idolatry in twi

AND the **dots were connecting BACK to wierwille.** Then, Geer comes smugly across the Atlantic

"with the last will and testament of victor paul wierwille".....to re-establish the servitude/pecking order

and allegiance to twi's so-called "father in the word." [uGH]

It was a slap in the face.

Socks....wherever you are, thanks again for your posts and insight. :)

But once I got my eyes on the actual information it seemed a little....thin....and more than a little....self serving. Sure it was meaningful to the time and the people, all of us. But it wasn't worth losing much sleep over.

VPW had been sick for years before he died. In fact, the overall time of the Way under his acting leadership was relatively short, from the formal filming of PFAL in 1967 to his death in 1985. In fact it could be argued he really only put in about 12 - 13 really active years as President of the Way before he was hampered by illness. Sure, the Way times their history back decades before that but "The Way" we came in contact with, the guy in the skinny black suit wiping his schnozz and saying "Dot's RIGHT!" every 5 minutes really memorialized in 1967 - and then quickly became outdated within about 2 years. He was reinventing himself very quickly, then.

You know I don't write off all of my years and work I did with others, what I learned and the wonderful people I met like yourself. But I lost my rose colored glasses long ago. It burns some people that I'm so blunt about it while valuing the Word of God and the relationships I gained. But I do, to me there's no conflict left, "it is what it is" and was, the good, the bad, and the ugly. I only have one thing left now, and that's more than enough for me.

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So......according to Geer's letter THIS was the problem:

"What has occurred is like a fire-fighting team trained to handle a specific emergency. When the emergency arises, the training would have proved to be adequate; the equipment would have been adequate; but those trained do not will to respond or they respond inadequately. Dr. Wierwille's burning, heart desire for The Way Corps was that there would be men and women to carry on the great outreach of the integrity and accuracy of God's Word - It Is Written - when he had fallen asleep. When there was no response, or inappropriate response, by those who had been trained or equipped, the response of those who were untrained and unequipped might have been long on zeal but all too short on knowledge.

Click Here --- on page 1

There it is in a nutshell......Geer states that wierwille's burning, heart desire for corps was to KEEP YOUR ALLEGIANCE TO VPW/TWI AND RUN PFAL.

What a garbled non-response response to "the root problem" in twi......of which, it seems to me that corps and clergy were EXITING twi for greener pastures and personal pursuits. The mystique of wierwille had been RUNNING ON FUMES FOR YEARS......and when vpw died, with health issues and he couldn't seem to believe God for his own healing, the myth of the man was decimated to his staunch "leaders." The gig was up.

For those who were paying attention, this was not news. Peter W@de split out in 1975. Some clergy I knew had quietly left in 1978. Some corps grads were going to Chicago to get doctorates of divinity. Other corps grads, like Rev. L0nnel Johns0n were pursuing master degrees, [1983 ??] etc. Dozens and dozens of others were exiting each year.

IMO.....Geer was calling out these "top-tier corps grads" who were abandoning ship. Oppression in wierwille's organization had run its course......and besides, after you've sat in pfal 25 times, the "whole package" no longer fit like a hand in a glove. It was a canned spiel. And, Geer's accusatory letter had broad brush strokes that seemed SO JUVENILE for a man who was, supposedly, a heartbeat away from the mog of the universe......ppfffft.

I refused the accusatory tone and implications of Geer's letter and "spiritual perception." He was wrong. He didn't know my laboring for the Lord; he didn't implore a sampling of our prayer life and serve in the One Body; he was simply attempting to subjugate my allegiance back to wierwille/twi.

I knew it then.....and understand it much better now.

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I remember the tape he sent to all the Corps, about how we were all copped out, off the Word, in need of a total re-boot. It made me feel all condemned. And confused. How would he know? But I was still indoctrinated so I bought it.

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I remember the tape he sent to all the Corps, about how we were all copped out, off the Word, in need of a total re-boot. It made me feel all condemned. And confused. How would he know? But I was still indoctrinated so I bought it.

We had something like that in FellowLaborers. I think it would have been about 1977. Middle of the night..We were all copped out...Bringing down the whole "ministry".. Word Over The World wasn't happening and it was our fault..Program was immediately canceled and then on again just a few hours later...Must tow the line completely to continue in the program....blah, blah, blah, yada, yada, yada... :yawn1:

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