Broken Arrow

Oh, the Postum thing. Forgot about that. There was also some kind of chicory stuff we were told was delicious, too. I'm with you, T-Bone; give me a cup of regular Joe and make it strong.

Was it spiked with drambuie?

How was this for an ice cream topping?

SoCrates

Blasphemy!

Well I'll be danged! Now I do remember a gum incident. There was a particular kind of gum that had a liquid center. If you bit into it, it "exploded". I think it was Sunesis' sister who called it "cum gum"....Can I say that here?

NO!

Oh, here's another crazy fad. We weren't allowed to have pets of any sort, so we went to

the Wayside Truck Stop and brought little gel caps that had expanding sponges in the shape of animals in them. Then we went through a phase where it seemed like everyone had a "pet" . I gotta tell ya. there is nothing quite so relaxing as tossing around the old frisbee with your very own pet jade plant.

Definitely a cry for help.

Was this part of "nature's little scrub brushes"?

Wordwolf, yesterday you said that,

"1) Old man Wierwille never taught safe boundaries. (We know what all his children said, and how they turned out.)

We also have some testimony as to his own behavior.

I had asked you just what did his children say, and what's wrong with they way they turned out? Is there something written, or was there a conversation someone had with them?

A long time ago, I heard that skeptics who are fooled by someone become the most hard-nosed

dogmatists for a con, because they started from the position that they were UNABLE to be

conned. They had absolutes and thought that they could see through ANY level of con

NO MATTER WHAT- so all the conman had to do was exceed their threshold of skepticism, and then

he didn't have to try so hard to keep his con going. They already went from "skeptic" to

"conned victim."

YES!! Well said. Those who think they can't be fooled again are running a risk of being vulnerable to another con. That may sound unlikely, but it's true. Those who realize that they can be fooled, are in a better place because they recognize their vulnerability. It's important to know one's weakness so we can watch and be ready, and also we can lean on others for support.

There was one time a guy in town was promoted to crew leader in a Wendy's. He had them align the chairs in the lobby with a string. I thought it was more of a military thing.

I never asked him if he was in the ministry.

SoCrates

Oh, that's funny! It's probably a good thing you didn't ask him about the ministry, though, he had to have been TWI.

quote: quote: What is the common denominator? Is it not desire?

No.

Then what is it?

I would be more than happy to discuss "love", and the "love of God" with you. I'm interested in an exchange of ideas, but I'm not interested in a game of "dueling doctrines".

Anyway, with respect to love, you and I both know that with us humanoids desire is inconsistent. We make commitments to love a spouse "till death do us part". We have a responsibility to love our children. If we adhere to the Christian ethic, we are supposed to "love the brethren" as well as those who are "without" (No, I'm not delving in to that silly "in the household, outside the household" claptrap that in reality was an excuse to acting hateful to people we didn't like. If you don't know what I'm talking about, don't worry about it).

Therefore I say that the least common denominator for love is actually commitment. I know, I know...we've been beaten over the head with that word too, but hear me out. Sometimes for whatever reason we may not have a "desire" to love our spouses, children, brethren, etc. Sometimes people act less than loveable, sometimes we ourselves are acting like jerks, but desire comes and goes. If that's what we're basing things on, then we'll quit on somebody as soon as we don't feel good about it. I'm not talking about staying in abusive relationships. That's a subject with its own path.

Anyway, just my thoughts.

The whole development of the weird fetish like fascination with properly aligned and regimented stuff, be it pins, chairs or hair lines, was well...really weird.

There's a play on a quote that goes: Those who can, do: those who can't, teach; and those who can do neither, administer.

James Baldwin the author said this which is kinda related: "Those who say it can't be done are usually interrupted by others doing it."

Add in a little "lead, follow or get out of the way" and there's an idea there somewhere.

Early on the activities at the Way were pretty much relaxed and enjoyable. Years pass and with increased "knowledge" and "maturity" you get a passle of poorly packed procedures and pain-in-the-tushes worrying about how straight the chairs are and if the mints are fresh and properly distributed in their little sissy bowls, ready for that unfortunate teacher at the podium whose breath is so atrociously rank that some form of masking is required less, I guess, the front row pass out from the sheer putridity of their breath. I guess - I never understood why anyone would actually need breath mints at that point. Before, I get it. After, I get it. Alone at the podium, speaking to a group....? That's some serious stank. Thus I've pondered - the need for Mints. Perhaps after running my mouth off for 1/2 hour or more some refreshment is needed, the better to remind those I see immediately after of how sweet every word that comes out of my mouth really is. I dunno.

Our family has a little saying when we've been working or having serious fun and it's time for a shower, I confess to having introduced it and it seems to live on - average activity produces "1/4stank".....up from there you're at "1/2 stank" and a shower or bath is pending...."3/4 stank" - it's time. "Full Stank" - get the hose, you've reached Discovery Channel status, proceed to the Rhino's Pen.

Mints at a podium to keep one's salivary glands at full function - kinda tweezey. Kinda tweezey.

All of that stuff would give a stroke to anyone and I don't say that lightly. The worry, the fear that "something" wouldn't be exactly right and the full potential of the moment marred if not terminally damaged to the extent that the person holding forth so boldly in this day and time would what - be peppered so powerfully by packs of daimonion that they'd have to split their brain into two and devote half their believing to flooding their hedge of protection with plugs to fill the holes created by the utter chaos of someone sneezing at the wrong time? Is there ever a right time to sneeze? Or because a door slammed - possibly caused by some poor soul leaving, over come by the breath of the teacher who forgot to write in his notes "use the mints" because he'd had to park his own car and thus so horribly distracted by the walking then forgot to remember the mints? Or something?

This kind of paranoid pea-pickin' hardly characterizes a corps like regiment of highly trained, able bodied and fully prepared leaders. If you can't handle the kind of stress produced by improperly placed water glasses, what are you going to do when faced with the big stuff, like the front row not laughing at the right time or worse, laughing at the wrong time? And especially when that should be a no brainer since they've heard it all before many times?

In a way it's surprising their weren't more strokes.

You know, some of us could have one heckuva stand-up comedy routine if only more people could relate to this stuff.

Who on earth ever came up with idea of stringing chairs? I mean, talk about a waste of time and resources! We would even have work assignments dedicated to stringing chairs. Yep...the peak of leadership training.

"Pin Protocol".

The HS dove pins were niceI and the blue "WOW" pins kinda snappy. But then you add a nametag pin to the assemblage and you're doing cross stitch to your coat. All those holes Now that's devilish. But I always liked wearing the dove pin as long as some horse's as s didn't come along and feel me up getting it to fly one direction or another.

Oh crap, socks, now you have me re-living the trauma of it all. I'd forgotten about all that! Ooh! I hated it when some self-righteous whatever would come along and re-adjust my holy spirit pin! It was so condescending. When someone did that you were supposed to be thankful. Yech! Of course, I ended up doing that too.

quote: What is the common denominator? Is it not desire?

No.

The best time for many people to be in the Way was when they were getting in - once you "knew better" all hel l could break loose if your Holy Spirit dove pin dove the wrong way....

You know, that is really funny, especially that way you put that, but I actually witnessED that happen at a Corps night. 3-piece suits were in vogue in my day, and some poor guy had his Holy Spirit (proper noun so it should be capitalized in this instance) pin on his jacket lapel, and his W.O.W. pin on his vest, ON THE OPPOSITE SIDE!!!!! Everybody knows that the holy spirit dove down toward the W.O.W. pin, and the pin should always be over your heart!!! WHAT WAS HE THINKING???

not saying i have the answers - these are just some things i wonder about whenever a discussion gets into the love sinner/hate sin thing....

does the catchphrase "love the sinner but hate the sin" have any scriptural basis?

The gospels make note of Jesus' association with sinners. What was his position toward unrepentant sinners?

Psalm 11:5 NIV says The Lord examines the righteous, but the wicked, those who love violence, he hates with a passion.....so if we're made in the image and likeness of God - - is that possibly the key feature that enables not only self-examination [an effective and sometimes painful function of our conscience] but also gives us the capacity to hate an evildoer. Furthermore - is it reasonable to assume that this hatred may possibly be following some godly parameters already built-in by the Creator in designing creatures who have some characteristics similar to Himself....

~~

sometimes i get sick and tired of religious talk that seems to separate the sin from the sinner in an almost slight-of-hand fashion painting up the sinner as if THEY are the victim in the situation [sorta "the-devil-made-me-do-it" syndrome].....imho it's a smokescreen to hide the fact that they are the AUTHOR of the sin - they are the culprit in the situation....

~~

check out how Paul loved the sinner but hated the sin in I Corinthians 5 - he basically advised the church to throw them both out!

As far as your example, I think later in II Corinthians you find Paul advising the Church to let them back in. So on it goes, each one of us finding a Bible passage to support our position. I know what you're saying, though, about developing catch-phrases. It seems there are always people who want to reduce truths to tripe little catch phrases. To me, this waters down the impact of whatever the truth is. We've all heard plenty of catch phrases and pretty soon they become as meaningful as "Have a Coke and a smile", or "You deserve a break today" (I'm dating myself).

If you really want to know, this question of separating the sinner from the sin is not hard to answer. I won't bore you with an answer because I think most of you already know what I would say.

My understanding, from another thread, is he bragged about it in a private corps session or two.

See post #243 of the "Was VPW A Good Man" thread. (link)

SoCrates

Right, he bragged about his youngest daughter. Wordwolf said, "we know what ALL his children said and how THEY turned out". I'm not aware of anything that was said by the youngest daughter let alone the rest of the Wierwille children. As far as the how they turned out, is there something wrong with the way they turned out? Except of course, Donnie becoming V.P. of TWI and J.P. helping to start S.O.W.E.R.S.

There were times I've been an "evil, vicious man", just ask my first wife and daughter; they still love me. Other people love me too. Go figure.

If my memory serves me correctly, according to P-O-P he didn't want to do the businessman's class at Gunnison, but that he was talked into it by Bob W.

At the time, I remember resenting that class being run for businessmen "who didn't have time", as if their time was more important than others. It cut across all of us, in my opinion, who had to convince everyone else that PFAL was worth the time commitment. I felt it further evidence that there were social classes within TWI. Normal dolts such as myself had to play by the rules but if one made a lot of money, exceptions were made for you. That is so obvious now that the statement I just made is laughable. But in 1984 I was just starting to see this stuff.

Sorry, I guess that didn't exactly answer your question. No, I wasn't at the class, I was at home being angry about it.

I think T-Bone gets it.

1) Old man Wierwille never taught safe boundaries. (We know what all his children said, and how they turned out.)

We know what all his children said? Really? Is it written somewhere? I'm not being contentious, I'd really like to know because I wasn't aware of any public comments by any of his children. What's wrong with "how they turned out"? J.P., I guess, has that silly S.O.W.E.R.S. thing going on, but other than that....

Well there you go! Socrates and I didn't have the believing to see it through. Since it was in the senses world, the devil gave the idea to Al Gore. Now look at the mess, all because of me and Socrates!

Yeah, DW said that during '89 Corps week when LCM did his Galtians teaching. Talk about using the Bible to fit your own agenda!

Thanks Wordwolf, but we're wondering if anyone knows about V.P. having a stroke while he was teaching.

I was at Emporia in my final year when he had his stroke. I don't recall that information being withheld, but maybe I'm wrong. That's just my own recollection. In fact, I think Craig discussed it later during a SNS, or some service from HQ. Of course, he was talking about it affected him.

The further up the ladder you go, the more you have to sell yourself out; the more you have to compromise your principles..

SoCrates

I'm just not ready to concede that point. I think there are still good people out there with power, at least I hope so. I agree with everything else you say. Including the part where you said VP considered himself entitled to things because of the perceived "good" he did.

I took the Advanced Class at Emporia. I wasn't there an hour before some Corps guy on a bike felt it important to comment on how I looked. . . . how nice it was to have some pretty girls around. Innocent enough I guess, but I can remember it made me uncomfortable.

I had to change my seat more than once because the guy behind me decided to give me a neck rub. One time I got into an ugly confrontation because the man/boy sitting behind me...after I asked him not to touch me...continued to paw me. When I told him firmly ......not to touch me....I remember his response....."I am just trying to bless you" I knew that was manipulative even then....and I had to move my seat.

I don't think I was the particular guy because I didn't have a bike and I would not have been at your Advanced Class if you took it at Emporia. But I used to do stuff like that so it easily could have been at another place or time. So, FWIW, I apologize for these actions that were directed against you.

?

:

With all the yarns and tall-tales of wierwille.....how about Paul Bunyan?

Remember when vpw....with one swing of his axe cleared the Way Woods?

Then he and his bull "Babe" moved the Word Over the World! That's right, VP always had a lot of bull with him.

I remember during Living Victoriously (1982) one night a car with known troublemakers in it followed a believer's car outside HQ. There was an altercation. The troublemaker's car got dinged pretty bad. The troublemakers called the police and gave them Howard Allen's license # as the one who did it. So at 3:30AM the police came and HA had to try to start his car. He told police he hadn't driven it in 2 days, so when it didn't turn over immediately the police knew the known troublemakers were lying.

As for the bodyguards, a friend of mine who used to post here was in the 11th corps. He stayed until corps week in '89 or '90, can't remember which. He was listening to Don Wierwille talk and that did it for him. His real desire was to walk up to the front of the stage in the big top and just throw his corps nametag on the stage, but it occured to him that this might be hazardous to his health, so he and his wife just walked out of there.

I'm in the 11th Corps as well so I'm sure I know whoever that was. It was probably '89 and I'm wondering if it was when Don W. spoke in the WOW Auditorium during Corps Week (really Corps Days by then). I'm wondering because I had the same reaction. That was the year Martindale taught out of The Book of Galatians on the word "terasso". Basically, Martindale was saying Geer was full of it and trying to use the Bible to prove it. Craig and the BOT were breaking away from Geer.

To set the context, flashback to the Fall of '82 which was the 11th Corps' final year in the stockade residence, Don met with the 11th Corps. The Corps Week before that was when a paper was read called, A Day with the Wierwilles. In that paper, VP was quoted as saying, "If the Wierwille family does not stand together on the Word, the Word of God will not live in this day and in this time."

Don Wierwille was angry about that line. "I don't buy it! That the Word of God living would depend on the stand of one man, or one family! I don't buy it!" I was shocked. Here was the son of the MOGFOT disagreeing with his father on what dad had supposidely received via revelation. My opinion of Donald he was actually a doctor Wierwille substantially increased that day. Perhaps your friend was at that same meeting.

Fast forward now to Corps Week '89. The same man, Donald Wierwille, stood in front of the entire Corps and referred to that part of that paper as reason the Corps should stand with him and his mother. It was a complete contradiction and it sealed for me that Don Wierwille was a liar and an opportunist. I wanted to go up front, grab that mike and say, "But that's not what you said a few years ago, Don!" I would have never made it on the stage and I knew that. I also knew that even if I did, Wierwille would either say I was lying, or he would have said he simply changed his mind. Still, I know what I heard. That sealed the deal for me right there. I was out. I wonder if your 11th Corps friend was at those same meetings I was and had the same reaction.