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Or perhaps old puke from last night's bad drunk. It's still fun to make fun of memories of them worshiping over the porcelain god and speaking in liquid screams. Shot 'o Drambuie anyone?

What happened to all my prayers? Ya know, before I ever heard of The Way, I had no idea my prayers were second rate. Then I got witnessed to and found out I had it all wrong. See, you can't actually talk to God like you talk to everyone else. You have to have this special language, that they speak in the land of Lo Shanta, or God won't have a clue what you're talking about.And, God can't talk back to you either unless you talk to yourself in this new language lots and lots every day. And you have to make a real effort to expand your vocabulary, too, or God will just keep telling you the same stuff over and over again. Heck, I've even heard people say they prayed to God for answers (without the Lo Shanta stuff) and, presto, someone from TWI appeared to invite them to Twig and sign them up for PLAF. But, how can that be if God can't understand your prayers in the first place? So then my question is this: What happened to all those prayers I said before I heard of TWI?

In my former splinter group (River Road Fellowship as led by V. Barnard) we did the whole, "We are a whole world unto ourselves, isolated in a rural area" thing and it $ucked bigtime. Every perception of truth was tightly controlled by the supposed Apostle. It seemed to me like over time things just got more and more warped. Eventually it was heresy to even question such "apostolic" blunders as him teaching the Lord would return in 1997, 2000, uh er...2001, 2002, 2003, 2005, and even the latest that I've heard on the grapevine 2011. Not to mention the oppressive atmosphere which led to such unfortunate things as teenage girls announcing in fellowship that,"I am married to the Christ in Victor." So while they constantly congradulate themselves among themselves it seems pretty obvious to me that they only grew more dangerous and absurd as time went on. And I really don't think they'd openly come around GSC to state their case either, but they'd say it was because of all they "unbelief" here at GSC I'm sure. But I am certain it is because that even though they imagine themselves to be winners that they would simply be confronted for what they really are. I feel justified in my concerns for Caleb and his fellows.

So without further response from Caleb is this how we are to see this exchange end? One young man takes a small step out of the Mississipi swamp and into a place where all his beliefs he must knew may be challeged. He gives an aggressive post with a direct threat while claiming he will be handling questions and conversations for months to come. And as soon as a teany little bit of heat arrives he steps out, omly to never be heard from again. OMG I would like to believe the young man is o.k., but nobody that knows anything is saying! Is he being shut in with a bunch of faithful for a patented TWI style "healing". Are they mad at us enough to foolishly desire to carry out the feelings of anger in the initial post? Is the young man strong enough to realize that our intentions were for his own good and it may be that his "manoGod" is the real villain? But even though v2p2 may well be carrying out that role I do personally feel compassion for a young man who himself has been indoctrinated into his supposed life's purpose. TOO MANY QUESTIONS, TOO FEW ANSWERS. IMO

Maybe irrelevant.

Its not old news for all of us that gave our time & money for a rot hole place called THE WAY INTERNATIONAL that claimed to be a place of god. It wont be old news until no one is standing for or preaching their crap and that land in ohio is washed away . and only then will it be old news !!

Oh for Pete's sake, Oldies..........quit SPINNING and DANCING around the room. Wierwille BETRAYED his committed followers......most notably, the WOWs and the Corps. As a young and naive WOW, catcup's sister came face-to-face with wierwille's sexual motorcoach lusts and, when she refused, she was kicked off the WOW field. And, its well documented on the forums how wierwille went after the Corps women..!!!!! Can't you see the snare...??? With no accountability for his actions......and being in a well-protected, multi-tiered yes-men hierarchy, wierwille's TRUE COLORS CAME FORTH. What he was.......behind closed doors..... was his TRUE CHARACTER. Those public appearances were just showmanship......no more, no less. Wierwille BETRAYED "his" corps........he sold many of us down the river. He couldn't even keep his commitment to us regarding THE CORPS CHALET. He gave it to his top yes-boy......craig. There is a HUGE chasm between............freely serving God without compulsion as opposed to being manipulated by a con-man who winks with his eyes and speaks with his fingers (Proverbs reference). But hey.........if you, Oldies, want to stay deceived about "the good ole way-daze" have at it. Doesn't look like too many folks here are buying what you are attempting to sell.

Well, obviously, those prayers were thrown in the same cylindrical file as those of the Catholics, Mormons, Christian Scientists, Penticostals, Anglicans, Presbyterians, Lutherans, Methodists, and all the other various and sundry Christian brands. You see, you have to get it JUST right or God won't pay attention. Misunderstand HIS Wurd, pray "improperly", or believe "wrongly" - NO SOUP FOR YOU! There now, doesn't that explain how loving and faithful The Almighty is? It's all YOUR fault. The truth is so simple...

I wonder if they like millet.

hmmm

not really a side rail, since I did rant on about a few things and M. W@l@ce's tendency to lie was right up there. I also remember that "teaching", and it became very much part of everyday life. "it's ok to lie to unbelievers to protect yourself or the ministry" was doctrine. I guess M@rk and a lot of others have put it into practice as "it's ok to lie to everyone to make yourself and the ministry look good".

thank you to the anonymous writer for taking the time to put that together. it sounds like the same twi I left in 2006, only more mummified.

ah, them! context is everything. I was just talking about them somewhere else, as a matter of fact. they are asleep. drones. I suppose some of them are so damaged by being raised inside they will never recover. they will abuse because they were taught to be that way. I don't know that I can say they're all abusers, though. you'd know better than I.

it's when you put a hash in front of a word, like #theway or something like that, so people can find tweets about certain subjects. I read it's been successfully used for organizing rallies and other stuff, like the #amazonfail hash brought attention to amazon's catalog mess. made me wonder if there are any hashtags in use for twi subjects.

LOL! gawd you make me laugh. do you know what first sale is, where it came from, and where it's codified? since you obviously don't, I'll explain it. first sale doctrine (later expanded to "exhaustion of rights") regarding a copyright holder's control over copies they have distributed was established by case law about 90 years ago and is now codified AS copyright law. I'm not jumping around anywhere, I've been speaking to the same point all along, which is whether or not twi has any rights to control copies without proof of ownership. if they didn't report the copies stolen, didn't have anyone sign contracts for lease/rent/lending, and in all likelihood the statute of limitations has run out on any possible cases of theft(which would have to be proven in court), it's all likely moot at this point because twi has no rights to the tape sets floating around. very unlikely. they'd have to prove they own the set to get eBay to take action against a seller like that.

I agree with you, but I bet he could have passed a lie detector test if he was in his narcissist zone. I think he had delusions of grandeur and creating stories was no different for him than giving a factual account of what he had for breakfast.

how did they specify it? is there a written contract signed by each person receiving the tapes, or a blanket contract filed somewhere signed by each borrower, as we do when we apply for a library card? what I want to know is if there is a legal contract. if not, then the physical transfer of the tapes from twi to an individual qualifies as "first sale" and twi's downstream rights to control are terminated. plus, anyone purchasing the tapes on good faith is not bound by any contract entered into by someone else with twi, so they are free to dispose of the tapes as they see fit.

The only guy who can answer those questions is currently feeding the worms.

Try this on for a non-sexual twist. Wierwille insisted LEAD participants had to hitch hike from Ohio to New Mexico and back. Guess what? That's illegal in most parts Ohio as well as many areas they would have had to pass through. Wierwille lived in Ohio most his life. If he didn't know that, he should have. Ignorance of the law is no excuse. People WERE raped, beaten, even killed as a result of this decision. He was complicit.

I just always assumed English is not Pond's first language. I PROMISE, I am not being rude, but that has been my thought when reading her posts. Pond, is English your first language? It might help others to know if this is not the case. Sometimes your posts are confusing to read. . . I am not assigning motives to your words. . . just seeing if maybe it is a language issue??

What or whom exactly on this site has zero integrity?

we have no reason not to believe anyone is lying about their story unless it can be proven they are. for instance, I don't assume you're lying about being at Emporia, or that your wife worked for vpw at HQ, although I have no way to corroborate your testimony. I just don't have any facts on which to claim your statements are untrue. I also have no reason to believe that the women who've told their stories about being raped by vpw are lying, therefore, like rascal, I will accept them as factual unless I have good reason to believe they aren't.

Now why would we want another case when you've already declared that "the context was VPW."?

I guess that I don`t understand NOT being offended and talking about the perves in sheep`s clothing. It is unconscionable NOT to shout from the roof tops the crimes of vp and twi....lest people spend the rest of their lives trying to apply the foolishness that we believed was *THE truth* given to a man by God. When people know who and what these guys were, what they did to our brothers and sisters, we are free to begin the healing process, begin growing again as people. Without the truth, we are forever stuck living false teachings and accepting the blame personally for their failure.

This is not an anti twi site, I think that is a dishonest statement. What it IS...is a place to tell what happened to us in twi...tell our stories. If twi had been a place of blessing and growth, then that is undoubtedly what we would be writing about here. Unfortunatelty, many of us experienced privation, abuse, and had crimes committed against us....so THAT is what is discussed by those whom experienced it. Gosh....If twi had been the God centered group that we had been led to believe, (and don`t we all wish that it HAD been) we wouldn`t have anything to talk about here now would we? Dove, maybe what you ought to be asking yourself is....Why you would need to come to a site and spend a decade trying to discredit the experiences of other posters. The whole site isn`t a lie, the participants aren`t all liars.... Maybe the error is in your perception of what you understood twi to be. This place is for talking about twi ... good, bad or indifferent....too bad more of us weren`t better treated, the flavor of the place would be a little different.

those incidents have been documented, here at GS, where anyone can read and refer to them.

thing is, the "word" was supposed to make us stronger. the "ministry" was supposed to be a safe haven. I'd already been hurt. spent time in therapy, was making good, positive changes in my life. the "promises" of god attracted me because I wanted to be stronger, serve god, and be around people who lived a loving lifestyle. twi was just not the place to find that, and the damage done by leadership put me in a place worse than I'd come from. so yeah, life hurts sometimes, but I find that in post-twi, now that I'm in a place where I've learned to think for myself, I handle the hurt better and I'm not in constant fear of someone melting my face over trivialities. I'm better equipped to handle the tough things in life now that I've shed the false trappings of pretended strength we were taught in twi.

Geisha is of the female persuasion. . . did you just call me clueless, a devil, take the Lords name in vain, call me self-righteous and a failure all in the same breath? You must be tired now. LOL Classic!

Well, I'm not Steve, but I would submit that that the only way any human has ever observed ANYTHING is by way of the senses. "Believing first and then seeing" is simply a textbook method of being taken in. And I would also posit that in the Bible quotation noted, that Thomas is the most virtuous one of the lot. Demanding proof is not an evil practice. It's a disciplined approach to figuring out REAL answers in life instead of accepting fairytales as guidance. "Believing first" never discovered any cures to disease or launched any satellites. Nor did inquisitive skeptics ever ride off on a Crusade or fly an airliner into a skyscraper...

I mind as well just walk up to wayfers and say "flying spaghetti monster, now go away"

The random snow squall argument is a bust. Not a cloud in the sky. Wrong time of year. No supporting records. Plus, according to TW:LIL, it was a "phenomenon" which means it could not have been a naturally occurring event anyway. So a random squall would not qualify as phenomena. And, if it was possible for it to be a naturally occurring random squall, why would he be so amazed at it anyhow? So, the possibility of it being a random squall is a moot point. Not even worth considering. The only thing left is phenomena. But Wierwille himself taught that the fleece deal in the O.T. was a one time event and that you can't order God to give you a sign, order up phenomena. Well, if he was right about that, he disproved his own snowstorm. If he was wrong, and he really saw it, the snowstorm would contradict his teaching on the subject and thus flush his credibility down the crapper. But personally, I like Groucho's take on it the best.

Wow, Potato, that's a bit of a turn-round. Musta been after they got really scared by LCM's shining example. No, wait, his example was to mate everyone in the household. I have a dim recollection somewhere (CFS??) of VPW saying that some rules applied when we were younger but not necessarily when we were older. You tell a five year old not to do something (for his own good - like not crossing the road alone) but you don't need to tell a 25 year old, who has by now learned how to cross safely. I think the inference (don't think it was explicit) was that sex was out for young kids/ teenagers but for adults it was a normal part of life. Sound familiar, anyone?

yes. all were expressly forbidden. I think that clas also had a lot more emphasis on the man being the head and the woman being his servant. since I was recently divorced, it pretty much seemed designed to make me condemn myself.

Boy, I'm glad I can't remember much about this class. I do remember one class where there was some dissection of Song of Solomon and the alleged sexual allusions in that - was that CFS? Or maybe New Life (a Corps class)? That's really all I think I remember and sincerely don't want to drag anything else back into mind. Too right, P-Mosh. I've always wondered why Americans are so prissy about a breast or a bare bottom. It doesn't have to be provocative. And bear (bare?) in mind that most movies are Hollywood so shot with US money and manage to have body parts on display. Yet the whole hippy "free love" thing emanated from the US - in other words, the display of body parts didn't have anything to do with loosening sexual boundaries in the US. The violence and wanton destruction in some US movies is horrendous. Gratuitous. And I think that watching too much violence without also showing repercussions does break down mental boundaries. But that's another thread should anyone care to go there.

I don't see you starting WW3 WD. However... Edited again - I stand corrected by potato - it was your question to skyrider I was referring to.... Since you and I disagree on a number of issues - please do not take my comments as starting a personal WW3 with you either. I think the obvious answer to your question for potato is rather simple. You know, as well as I do, that a significant percentage of people (I'd wager some number >50%) were wrapped up in that organization enough to feel guilty about NOT doing as told. This is not isolated to TWI - you can trace it to plenty of other organizations - even those non-religious - heck you can extend it to some 1960's hippie communes. There have been plenty of posts here from people "admitting" to feeling bad about decisions/actions they made/did "back in the day." It is clearly not an isolated phenomena - and those who posted that thinking here on GSC tend to have a more activist mentality. I wonder how many people felt that way and just drifted off without coming here - without posting - and did whatever (hopefully got a life). I have a somewhat personal perspective on rebellion within the ranks - since I had a reputation for it even while still in but I am not going to post it publicly. Edited for some grammar errors

I think that in Wierwille's case, that he was more than happy if he had you thinking well of him and searching for those secrets. I bet people have wasted decades on that particular treadmill. Say what you mean and mean what you say only applied if the decievers wanted to know where you really were coming from in order to counter your influence as it applied to dominance. (added in eding) I'm going to go now. Catch up wit ya later.

do we think humpty was an egg for the same reason we think jesus was a white guy with blue eyes? illustrated children's books?

signs of a liar: I saw a lot of these in vpw's videos, and even more so in lcm's.

I noticed in session three, he scratched his nose 3 times with his right hand at 3 different points during the teaching. I think that means that his words in that session were completely, completely, completely blessed. Shhhhhhh!!------It's a secret. The DaVictster's Code Coming soon to a theater near you.

LOL I knew somone would make a joke

has anyone transcribed the video class?

yeah, exactly. I seem to remember it, too. eventually I'll dig out all my books and old syllabi and be able to look things like this up. could it be in the intro to one of the class books? is the cassette class identical to the film (later video) class? did vpw maybe mention it during another class that was still making the rounds in the late 80's/90's?

4 or 5 what? shots of whiskey, hits off the pipe, what?

John and Yoko, 1971. "So this is Christmas And what have you done? Another year over And a new one just begun."

no, it's another example of a cost that should have been counted as a business expense and paid for by twi, along with the cost of stamps and money orders.

You need to read what's written on the page. I wasn't referring to my situation specifically. I was referring to the cost of food, gas, and wages in general, and how the cost of weekly mailing ABS could affect the average person working for minimum wage. You were saying it was no big deal and I was quantifying the accumulated costs. If you want to spend money on coffee and you figured out a way to keep the costs down that worked with HQ, more power to you. Other's didn't feel they had choices. I don't believe in the tithe now and I didn't then, either. I believe charity begins at home, particularly when I saw OPM being squandered on Harley tours.

Twi is SMALL POTATOES........because everything they do is SELF-SERVING, SELF-GRATIFYING and SELF-PRESERVATION. Twi does nothing for society. They bury all their "talents" in a hole and claim that they are "believing" God. Twi is a fear-based corporation.....captivated by fear of losing it all.

I don't think I'm one of anything, really. I'm currently without religion

are you pulling my leg ?