Rocky

What's with the persistent chip on your shoulder? By definition, YOU cannot label any other person's experience as being wrong. You say you have degrees in hard sciences. If that's where you stopped learning, that's just sad.

I wasn't resorting to any "fact." I was sharing MY EXPERIENCE. Are you telling me that my experience is wrong?

Are you suggesting that unless I come to agree with you, I am and will continue to be WRONG about all of what I have to say about TWI? Because that is very much what it sounds like.

Perhaps because despite your views/understanding of the notion, you're not going to change human nature in any way just by telling everyone here that belonging is childish or otherwise anachronistic.

No, that's not necessarily true. There was great joy for many at ROA gatherings... because people felt a sense of belonging to each other. Bolshevik, please find solace and peace... somewhere, somehow. Perhaps by finding a social network to and from which you can obtain a sense of belonging. Hostility? From me? That's not what you're sensing.

That's a statement of judgment, apparently not arrived at with any amount of empathy.

At no point in the comment (of mine) to which you replied did I mention or even allude to vpw.

Dude... I'm not the enemy. Cults' lure, whether you like it or not, is the sense of belonging they provide to recruits. Your questions neither confront ME, nor advance a position. If you didn't sound like you have a chip on your shoulder, I might be willing to engage in discussion on those questions. Bottom line: cults promise a sense of belonging. If they don't, people don't stay. Period.

Why do you think universities have fraternities and sororities?

Again, seriously? Belonging IS something that has been written about before... on GSC. IF you need any insight on where to find sociologist or psychologist research on the subject, just ask. Otherwise, ICSA might be a good place to start.

Seriously? Because you were born into it, YMMV, but many of us were not born into it. What do you understand the hook was that kept anyone in the cult for 12 years?

By then, many have realized (albeit temporarily) their sense of belonging is inextricably linked to the cult. The duration of that belonging depends on one's tolerance for control/abuse by the cult leaders.

word!

To echo Waysider: Do you know any sinners who are not saints? Seems to me that your question was a condescending way to dismiss the point to which you had responded. Have you EVER read Matthew 5:45?

I find it intriguing that we can joke or try to understand what's going on by use of current popular culture... but have you considered that we may not really have adequate understanding of the popular culture of Biblical time(s) to grasp what the prophets really meant back then? And it's probably fair to consider that the culture in Moses' time wasn't identical to the culture in Paul's era.

No, No and No. I am saying we don't adequately understand the culture(s) in which these STORIES emerged. Your questions suggest the stories must be taken literally regardless of the cultural context. That's definitely not the point I was making. Thanks for asking.

God loves you and has called you... but somewhere along the line, if you step out of line, you lose your salvation.

Wierwille (and Pillai) may have been on to something with the concept of Orientalisms. Except they focused to narrowly on individual phrases and expressions. Why did they not or would they not consider the entire culture from which the Old and New Testaments emerged and try to grasp the overall (i.e. the 30,000 foot view) in the first place? Just sayin'.

Read this WaPo story without charge because I have a subscription and provide the link because of it. Leaders in the Southern Baptist Convention on Sunday released a major third-party investigation that found that sex abuse survivors were often ignored, minimized and “even vilified” by top clergy in the nation’s largest Protestant denomination. The findings of nearly 300 pages include shocking new details about specific abuse cases and shine a light on how denominational leaders for decades actively resisted calls for abuse prevention and reform. Evidence in the report suggests leaders also lied to Southern Baptists over whether they could maintain a database of offenders to prevent more abuse when top leaders were secretly keeping a private list for years.

I couldn't have said it better myself. Heck, I never realized it was fake until the discussion came up on GSC. Your premise was actually a good conclusion to your post. I had been set up with expectation that someday I would SIT from two years or so before I took the PFLAP class. A HS friend witnessed to me less than a year after we graduated HS. I went to church with him for a couple of months and then shipped off to USAF basic training. In tech school in Biloxi, MS, I got in with a charismatic christian group. I was in MS for about 7 months then got stationed in the Azores. Roughly six months after landing there, I met up with a Military WOW. It took another 9 months to meet the numerical requirements to run the class. All of THAT time, I had been "trying" to receive the Holy Ghost. Never happened until session 12 in July 1975. Then I moved my mouth, and tongue and lips... etc. Now, 47 years later, I have a much better idea of why I couldn't let the spirit move me in the first place.

Twi's sense of belonging seemed to be predicated on claims by Victor Wierwille that only he had the RIGHT way to interpret scripture and therefore everything about life. Perhaps questioning EVERY thing about TWI is the beginning of the FREEDOM that comes from actually approaching TRUTH/FACTS/REALITY.

This Hulu series was... gah... yuck... I watched less than five minutes of it. Teal Swan is indeed MESSED UP. Her followers are needy and insecure. No thanks.