JavaJane

I was looking for a family..

I think this is why I stayed as an adult. My parents went into the FWC after I was slightly over the kid age limit, taking my siblings with them. I realized today that it hurt a lot. I remember crying at my boyfriend's house because "God was taking my family away.". (I later broke up with that boyfriend because my parents were upset he didn't want to take the class.). I felt abandoned, and went WOW to try and have some sort of group I could stick with. Those people took the place of parents and siblings... And when my parents wrere dropped from the WC and made mark and avoid, I dropped them (now ivrealize I partially did this because I felt they had abandoned me.)

Screwed up stuff. I won't do that to my kids.

I don't think I even really understood what family was until I married into my husband's family. They never give up on each other - even when they have screaming matches between brothers, or one of them does something asinine, they are still there for each other in an instant.

And that is what I thought twi was.

And it was the OPPOSITE of that.

I took the class because my mom had gotten involved with TWI and was gung-ho for "the Ministry.". Didn't really have much choice, but I was ok with it because I loved reading Bible stories as a kid.

I had a limb coordinator's wife who told me she took the class because she wanted to be right. At the time it sounded like a good reason, but now it just sounds weird. I don't care that much about being "right" and having the correct answer in black and white for everything just seems... Well... Pompous.

I'd like to hear some viewpoints from people who weren't "raised in The Word ™" as to why you took the foundational class, and why you stayed afterwards. Were there warning signs in the class that you ignored? And which class was your foundational class?

Or even bad counsel because they can't affOrd good lawyers... I have a family member who is a prosecuting attorney. He says he can't believe how many public defenders tell people who are innocent to plead guilty just to get them off their case load.

In comparison, Rosie, Vic, LCM, Howard Allen, et al have the best paid attorneys.

This just made me realize that I haven't gotten an ugly HoHo card in a couple of years....

YES!

Been wondering that myself, OS... Also been wondering how many twibots would run to this program if they knew it existed... It's TWI, but with passion and excitement.

It has to be "the rightly divided Word™ spoken on the lips of a believing believer™" in order for pain to be caused.

Then again, hearing Rosie's drawl causes me physical, mental, and emotional pain too.

I think they should send a group to New Knoxville and do some witnessing.

Come on, guys... It's just another Pagan holiday that should be crushed under the feet of "the househd of God."

(I will be happily hiding Easter eggs and eating ham, spending time with family, and generally praising God that I am not anywhere near New Knoxvie.)

I guess it depends on whether or not you believe in a multiverse

and then there's the whole thing about non-linear time.... And what about if you could live two different lives simultaneously?

Your not doing it out of love, but out of fear.

SoCrates

EXACTLY.

Sometimes I think people use "heaven" and "hell" as the reason they choose to do right or do wrong. The reward or the punishment at the end of life is the motivation to treat others with kindness, to not act out of selfish desires, to "do the right thing."

But if the reward for good behavior isn't there, or the fear of punishment isn't there, would they still be kind to others? Would they resist the temptation to steal from another person?

In a way, seeing good done by an atheist or an agnostic almost speaks of more altruism than those who are religious.

Why should we be nice to others if there is no one looking over us keeping score for the time you die?

Just thinking deep thoughts tonight... And I don't mean that atheist/agnostics/insert-random-belief-here-people are somehow better than Christians at all. I just think it is important for each person to understand why they do what they do.

Does that make sense?

I figure I won't know for sure until I'm dead myself... And I don't believe necessarily that Christianity is the only way to heaven of there is one. Guess my answer is - whatever works.

I do ABS... In the form of compost.

I agree, mstar... She's been a lot nicer to me than twi ever was.

Pulls out pom poms for JJ!

thanks, guys. As one of my cousins said, I need to "channel my inner badass."

I am doing so now. And if they fire me, I'll go litigious on their @$$es.

I've had my share of abuse from the cult I was in, I don't need it from my employer.

I have been dealing with some serious "facemeltings" at work from someone in a position of authority recently - and I have reached me breaking point. It hit me suddenly last week that this is exactly the same thing I suffered through with twi leadership. And more importantly, I don't have to put up with the abuse just because someone is in a position of authority. Guess I have grown a bit of a backbone since I got out.

I filed a formal complaint with the CEO on Friday.

Growing up in twi I thought yelling and screaming was normal behavior. And I thought taking it was being meek.

Not anymore.

Just read that the city we live in is 35th out of 35 major US metropolitan cities in danger of earthquake. Doesn't mean it can't happen, just probably not.

Personally Id be more concerned living around a paranoid end times cult than I would be about an earthquake.

An earthquake may or may not come, but you have some fearful extremists there already.

Exactly!!

SoCrates, I'm not freaked about an earthquake that may or may not happen - if a natural disaster happens, it happens. The town we live in has become the HQ for this church group that has a lot of similarities in their methods to twi. The town's population is exploding from a huge influx of members of this church. While in some ways it is good for our economy in the area, it's a little weird for me since they do so many things the way twi did. The first time I ran into a group of the teenagers they reminded me of Way Disciple/WOW young adult crowd that I used to be a part of.

Do you all think that twi-er's preparations (including so many people purchasing guns) could have gone really badly? Or was it all just silliness?

Ok. SoCrates, you freaked me out... We need to move. Not that far, just to the next town over because if there is a disaster like that this group is likely to close ranks and possibly blame those outside their group. And in this neighborhood it would be us.

I'm all for being prepared - having extra food and water and knowing how to survive if something bad happens. We have quite a bit of extra food and water around ourselves.

Now if they go out and tell us they bought guns I'm out of here. (Not that guns are bad - I just don't want to live next door to a paranoid member of an end of days cult who has some extra laying around.)

Had a flashback to our Y2K preparations in twi this weekend. Our neighbors belong to a group called IHOP (International House of Prayer). They approached me about a week ago with a pamphlet about emergency preparedness talking about how experts are expecting a HUGE earthquake in the Midwest and we all need to be prepared because we will be overrun by refugees. And then it escalated into the "nuc-u-lar" disaster that could be caused by said earthquakes.

This weekend they were gathering 50 gallon plastic drums for water storage. 2 for each person in the house (they live in community homes around this area near their headquarters - at this particular house it's a minister, his wife, and between 4-6 single women.). It's a lot of water barrels... Anyway, one of the girls keeps trying to witness to me (little does she know my Catholic-Neopagan leanings) - this week her message was about the end of the world.

So, my question is... Am I just freaked out because of the similarity to twi's Y2K prep, or does this sound potentially dangerous to anyone else?

I would say it was a lesson in forgiveness by way of a peice of stupidity. I learned to forgive my parents, myself, and my husband for being involved. And I learned I was completely capable of doing terrible things to others. Quite a lesson in humility.

I am not a big bible reader anymore but while we are on the subject I'd like to ask, did anyone else have trouble just reading the bible after wayworld?

I couldnt touch it and stay focussed for a good long time. Simple verses triggered entire way teachings before I would have chance to get to the next verse. Reading one verse would bring in a flood of old teachings and TWI style A.D.D. causing my mind to jump to 70 other verses before proceeding on.

Maybe it was me, but the programming was hard to break, as I said it took me a good 10 years just to be able to read it again with feeling that influence. The joy of just reading it which I once had has never been recovered.

I still have a hard time reading it (been out 5 years now, I think)... especially KJV. The more modern translations I am getting better with. At Ash Wednesday I went to church and they read the "Ambassadors for Christ" verse and my brain still went to Way Disciple, WOW land. But no PTSD flashback this time, so that was good.

I recently decided to take the Roman Catholic classes at my husband's family's church this year... Mainly because we are "getting married again" (not renewing vows - we hold the whole mess they called a wedding ceremony in the Way as a bad memory and we want a new start without the Way as a basis- but that's another story altogether...)

Anyway... I also have been asking God to help me get rid of any negative attachments in my life. Lo and behold.. In a period of three days we found three different boxes of twi materials my husband and I didn't even know we still had. This included several marked up Bibles. Since trash day was a week away, I drove all of it to a remote dumpster and dumped it. Bibles and all. And it was hard for me to do, because I still have respect for the Bible.... But those books were no longer Bibles, no longer holy books. They were just like everything else in those boxes - Way Ministry indoctrination materials and therefore not holy at all.

It was freeing to get rid of that crap.

I am only thankful that the only two people I wronged out of all my counseling session accepted my apology when I tracked them down to make things right after leaving TWI. Both of those situation went wrong from following the BOD instructions that were given me.

And that apology really helped at least one of those two... Just thought you would like to know.