My3Cents

I doubt if he even read Karl Barth let alone knew him. There were some people he said he hung out with in the early days - Oral Roberst, Starr Daily and some others. They aren't who I'd call heavies. But I also heard (and don't know where I heard it) that they ostracized him. Wouldn't surprize me if it happened and if he spun it his way.

3 words, Pat: FOLLOW THE MONEY

2 comments. There are many archane aspects of the law that don't make sense to people who are not lawyers. OK maybe they don't make sense at all but that's how things work. In most cases doing your own legal work is about as risky as taking out your own appendix. Secondly, lawyers love it when both sides "have a case." Makes for huge legal fees. Especially if both sides are emotionally attached to the outcome.

Sad though it may be, I believe it is wonderful (and unusual in my experience) for a therapist to be so up front about where her qualifications are and are not. Too many people think that because it's just "talk" that therapy doesn't require deftness and skill. Keep up the good work.

Socks, I thought the sound recorder that comes with windows only records up to 60 seconds. Are you saying a work around is to start with a longer file and record over it? Cool.

That's exactly how MLM's work. Shaklee, Amway, even the "good" ones all have very righ people at the top and lot's of folks below working their asses off to make it some day.

That's the crux of the issue - you've got to look inside yourself (therapy helps) and discover what unconscious need or desire your involvement with the way was meeting. Usually these things are not clear to the conscious mind. In my case it was a need for direction, a family, and the desire to justify myself, my purpose, my mission etc. with some external thing I trusted more than myself. I too came from the culture you did. What an irony that I really was seeking so much external validation and didn't realize it. You have to "do your own work" as they call it now; to see what the deal was for you. Interesting factoid - most of the people attracted to all cults over those years were young, educated, middle class.

It probably meant they knew all that ministering stuff was just hog wash and didn't want to burden themselves or you with it not working and then having to figure out who was to blame.

I have both on my computer and they work fine too.

I think the problem is that you have a standard you expect is "right" or "good" for people. You probably believe this standard is God's will or "the word" or something. The result is if people don't do what you think they should, you judge that as a weakness or something wrong. So your only choices are to try to change them (by confrontation or reproof or teaching) or to be quiet and hope they "grow" or change on their own. Either way you are judging them as not good enough because you have a standard you believe they should live up to. Perhaps I'm not like most people, but I don't feel real friendly toward people who think I'm not good enough. Just my 2 cents (and one for inflation)

Exactly. It's called progress. We've come a long way from days when people who weren't circumsized were treated as heathen and often enslaved, when Kings could tax their colonies without giving them a vote, when women couldn't own property, when blacks couldn't vote. Progress have never been accepted easily by all, especially by those in power. The absurd part is they often mistake progress as a personal threat when it could be seen as something they would enjoy.

Jonny, Is Walking in God's Power the class by Chris Geer?

Now if I make a piece of paper to look like a $20 bill, it's just art. Unless, I try to make someone believe it's a real $20 and since I'm not the government, and they are the only ones who can make a real one. Then my real art becomes a counterfiet bill. Now does that mean a bill printed by the government, would be counterfeit art if someone tried to put it in a frame and sell it? If they got more than $20 for it as art, would that be real or would that be counterfeit? Now if we could just make love instead of $20 bills it could be real art or it could be counterfeit love, depending on if we tried to pass it off as the real thing, or if we could sell it for more than $20 right? How enlightening!

Roy, I think I disagree with your premise, that everything has a counterfeit and a real. And the related premise that there is only one "real" and others must be counterfeit. There are many different loves - all real. Many books - all real. I disagree that love is "a [sic]easy one" or that it's counterfeit is hate. And you talk about a counterfeit church. I'm not sure I believe any church is real" but that doesn't make them all counterfeit. By setting up two such opposite view points you define the question to fit your own view. This is exactly what the way did in their logic. So even if you come to a different conclusion from them, your methods show a high degree of similarity. Since I got out, a huge change for me it to value methods, over conclusion. Life, as they say, is a journey not a destination.

Anybody who's attracted to this garbage deserves what they get. I bet the people most attracted are already in the way. So it was probably worth the money to make their innies feel good. I remember when I was in (the mid 70's I think) they produced a bunch of radio shows and had them run on real live radio stations. I bet they had to pay for that too. I felt like it added an air of legitimacy to what I was involved in. I'm sure it will have the same effect on folks involved right now. Of course it's bizzare that they post it on their web site. Are they going to encourage the innies to check out the web? Aren't they affraid it will lead to googling?

Paw, I have the utmost respect for what you've done here and that weather link is really a hoot. I do have one small nit to pick. The title of this thread. That farm in Ohio is not "Headquarters" to me. It may be The Way's HQ which would be acceptable. As I said it was a small nit. Keep up the good, I mean GREAT work.

It makes perfectly good sense to me. Kids are just dogs on two legs - there for the purpose of serving their master (I mean parents) right? And it fits with the word because we are here to serve our master and father, God. So it's biblical too. Of course, since it's the grace period (or is that grace semi-colon?) God doesn't beat us if we misbehave. But it still makes sense for us to beat our kids and dogs, because it says so in some book. It's been a long time since I left TWI but the logic is still there.

The legal aspect of marriage (as opposed to the religious aspect) has always been governed by the state since it is the state that protects and enforces the legal aspects of such a contract. If you've ever gotten divorced you know what I mean. But there is more to this than divorce. There is wealth and inheritance. When you die and your spouse inherits your money (or when you transfer money between you while alive) there are tax and other legal consequences that differ if it's your spouse than if it's your live-in significant other. If you are on life-support and they need next of kin to make a decision - a spouse is legally the next of kin. Not a person you may have been in a loving supportive relationship with for 20 years but never married. There is also the matter of employee benefits like health insurance, retirment etc. that accrues to a spouse but not a non-married lover. These are legal relationships hence the state's legal authority to define marriage. Aside from the moral issue that I don't think I (or anyone else) should dictate who gets to love another person - except the people involved, I think there is a societal benefit to encouraging long term loving relationships and the legal benefits that go with them. I think this benefit to society surpasses the fact that some may not like that a married couple is interracial. Interracial marriaged used to be illegal. I think this benefit to society surpasses the fact that some may not like that a married couple is of two different faiths. Inter-faith marriage may not be sanctioned by certain churches and that's their priviledge but it doesn't affect the legal aspect of such a union. I think this benefit to society surpasses the fact that some may not like that a married couple is of the same sex. The state is being very courageous in taking this stand as were states in the past to legalize interracial marriage, and non-religious marriage.

Actually it happens all the time. There is a lot of competition in the 24/7 news business (because really not that much NEWS happens all day every day) so they look for $$ anyway they can. Lot's of stuff you think is "media" is actually paid for. Did you ever listen to the audio channels on an airplane? They have at least one with interviews and blurbs about up and coming business ideas. They sound like news but they are paid for by the interviewees. How do I know? I've been asked to pay $4000 to have my coaching business put on the air. I declined. Makes me wonder about the music channels - do those performers or the record companies pay to get them heard? Could happen. Did you know food companies pay for shelf space in supermarkets? Yup. Doesn't surprise me at all that due diligence was not performed in filming a paying customer. I do agree with the poster that said there is no such thing as bad press. TWI will be able to use this to their advantage. Even if MSNBC makes a retraction or correction (which I doubt will happen) most who see it will not make the connection. AND TWI will be able to tell their followers "We were featured on blah blah blah." I'm sure they won't tell them they paid to get featured. So innies who don't check here (and many who do) will believe what makes them feel good. As they always have.

Nomad, That's not correct. The copyright laws give the creator of original work all the rights about how it gets copied (hence the name copyright). No one gets to copy any of it with or without proper credit unless they have permission. The exceptions to this fall under what's called "fair use". They include things like: The right to quote short sections in a review or the like, the right to parody, and the right to make copies of a work for your own use. This latter means if you own a book or CD or video you can copy it at will as long as you don't distribute, sell, give away etc any of the copies. (Software is a different animal because you don't legaly OWN a copy of software you are lisenced a right to use it under certain conditions). There are other fair uses but I can't remember what they are. FYI - I'm not a lawyer but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. Seriously, my ex-wife was in the licensing business and I used to work for her and became familiar with some of this stuff.

Hope, I suspect that the word "members" has some legal definition that applies in these situations. I don't think it applies to anything VPW said (not that what he said could be trusted anyway).

Sorry Mike,This is the kind of clap-trap that give believers a bad name (I know because I was one). They take an ordinary word or conecept and by analogy apply it in a spiritual context. In doing so they slightly adapt the definition so the result they want to support their belief comes out the back end and looks "pretty logical and basic" Love is a very broad term. There are many ways and shades and aspects of love. It's not always true that if we love them we love their words. Some people love people inspite of their words. Others love people who have no words (babies for instance). The next step in your basic logic will be (I presume) to say that you know what God's words look like or where they can be found. This is a slight twisting of the idea that we normally think of as "words" because all the words we know come from people. You have to make a leap of faith (not logic) to say that a word you see and hear coming a person is actually from God. Go for it dude. Believe all you want. Just don't expect me to accept that it's logical or basic. It's just what you want to believe.

I kept the belief that I can't figure out how to do anything on my own without consulting my leadership. And the idea that I should tell my leadership everything about my life - where I go every minute of the day, where I spend every penny and things like that. I kept the idea that I should have no contact with people outside the way except to try and convert them. I kept the belief that I shouldn't question why leaders do anything, or ask why things that are bad one day are OK the next.

When I got in the way (the 1970's) none of VPW's older kids really "stood" with him. And the younger ones were still in high school - and not really active as some of us other high school idiots were. His one daughter did edit his printed stuff but they were'nt "leaders" by any stretch - probably never even went to fellowship. Don was a principle of a High School in Wisconsin - if memory serves. I'm guessing he had earned a Master's degree. He was not active as a leader in the way till his daddy bought the Emporia Campus and Don came down to run it and get his PhD at a nearby college. He used his work running Emporia as his thesis. The plan was to buy Emporia in such a way as to keep it legally as the same entity and hence grandfather the accrediation. This would allow some way corps to get $$ from the GI bill to pay for tuition etc. But the deal fell thru and they ended up with the campus and buildings etc. but no accrediation. I don't know if they got snookered by the sellers, or their legal team bungled the deal. Anyway Don got a campus to play with and use for his PhD thesis. My personal opinion (with no evidence other than my feeling from knowing Don personally) is that Don would probably not have gotten involved with the way if that had not happened.

I was in the 5th way corps. I was in the Way starting in about 1970 - before there were corps if I recall correctly. Before the corps started, a few people were ordained - John Lynn, Steve Heefner, Jimmy Doop, John Townsend come to mind and I'm sure there were others. But they were a handful and my impression was they were "hand picked" by VPW himself. After people started graduating from the corps, there were many of the graduates ordained. By the time I graduated (fifth corps - 1978 I think??) the procedure was you got a letter a year or so after graduation saying ordination was available if you felt you could accept the committment. The ordinations happened in a large group. At corps week I think. The 5th corps was significantly larger than any before it (though quite a bit smaller than those that followed). We were told to find a clergy to lay hands on us at the ceremony. Some people seemed to know this was coming and had worked things out with "heavy hitters". In actuality there were almost not enough clergy to go around because our cohort was so big. I got laid hands on by someone I barely knew. It was never actually said how recipients of the letter were picked but in practice it seemed to be everyone who was still standing the year or so after graduation when the letters were sent out got one. Everyone who responded in the affirmative was ordained. I don't know how long that continued. I remember talking to Don Wierwille about a 4th corps grad who was ordained. This guy was a wonderful fellow but not and "on the field" type. He worked on staff in the auto shop. Don acted a bit surprised that he was ordained and Don recounted his conversation with the guy who said basically - when I got the letter I felt it was an opportunity coming my way so I accepted. That's my 2 cents & one for inflation.