Oakspear

The fact that none of us is the same as our physical father does not, by itself, prove that, Jesus is not God, or that there is no trinity.

Yeah WW, you've summed it up nicely as usual. Unfortunately, OM isn't the only one to have the "I left at the exact right time" syndrome. -_-

I was under that impression as well, but then again, I've personally met only three people on whom it was attempted: Lifted Up - successful; the Nebraska Limb Secretary in 1981 - successful; a ninth corps guy from western Nebraska - unsuccessful. So my personal experience is that it worked on 2/3 of those it was tried on. Not a scientific poll, I know, but could it be that TWI made sure that we knew about the deprogramming failures, and ignored the successes?

Goey, you are correct

I can see where ignorance of certain events, and a desire to grasp at any shred that would allow one to think that "the ministry" was what one thought it was, would lead one to give Martindale the benefit of the doubt. Knowing what we know now, believing that Martindale was right in issuing that letter, ignores...well, pretty much everything. The "loyalty letter" makes perfect sense in light of a control freak who was convinced that he was God's representative (or dead set on maintaining that illusion) trying to maintain that control. Despite what I've said about Wierwille being no different than Martindale in this regard, Wierwille convinced us that it was a ministry of God, and that it was our ministry, and that he, above all wanted us to stand for God and not for him...I don't believe that was what Wierwille really stood for though.

It sounded good, but Wierwille always got to decide what "the Word" was, didn't he?

Raf: It was me who called the letter a "hypocritical load of crap" Rascal: What I've said on this thread is not that I think that Martindale was right, subsequent events and the testimony of psoters who were around at the time indicate clearly that he was wrong, but that it should have come as no surprise. I see it as a natural reaction for a hypocritical jerk with a big ego trained by another hypocritical jerk with a big ego. Wierwille got rid of the people who saw through his crap too. He was just smoother and kept it behind the scenes. Martindale was too stupid, didn't have Wierwille's charisma or skill at manipulation, and bought into the "I am the MOG" mythos that Wierwille built in him. Wierwille expected people to follow him too. How do you think it would have gone if the Way Corps told HIM that they didn't stand with a man, they stood with God? I imagine that his answer would have been that standing with HIM was standing with God...but he probably followed it up with a hearty "haw, haw, haw...I shore love you kids"...as he showed them the door.

Let me clarify the point of this thread, at least what I had in mind when I posted it. There are those of us here for whom PFAL was originally and remains to this day everything that it claimed to be. Though I am not a PFAL fan, I'm glad you have something to "hang your hat on" spiritually. But although no one is checking your I.D. at the door, this thread really isn't for you, but for those who came to the conclusion that PFAL was deficient in some way, after initially believing what was taught there. What methods or teaching styles, what inaccuracies or misrepresentations, or even misconceptions or misunderstandings, led you to "fall for" something that you now believe is error?

Not everyone has the same definition...just trying to get it clarified.

Because it's not really an answer, now is it? If he's not "standing on the Word", then the honest thing to do (which many did) was leave. Like I said before, loyalty to a man was not a new thing in TWI, Wierwille required it, although he was a bit more diplomatic about how he stated it. Would Wierwille have put up with Limb Leaders or other staff sending their abundant sharing to Peter Wade? Granted, future events, as well as later unveiling of past events, show this letter for the hypocritical load of crap that it is, but unless one thought that they could affect change from within, that is, force Martindale to change or resign, and bring back the "good ol' days", why stay within the organization that is run by this horse's foot?

Oldies: If it didn't happen to you or around you, then you are fortunate. When it did happen, sometimes it was tolerated, sometimes it was not. But for a program where assignments were touted as being "by revelation", there sure were a lot of problems. And by the way, even consensual sex was contrary to the rules of the program. You're not saying that WOW's should have been enticing people to PFAL via sex, are you? I'm not saying that people didn't grow and mature, or that (within the context of TWI's version of what was godly) godly things didn't happen, or that God's Word didn't move on the WOW field, but that no training or oversight caused this to happen.

Well then, to quote VP Wierwille's mischaracterization of atheism: "You believed that you didn't believe, therefore you believed" :P

What happened if Henry Baloko physically assaulted Maggie Muggins? Or Snowball Pete was doing coke? Or Suzi Q was banging the guys she was "witnessing" to at the bar? Or Johnny Jump Up Way Corps family Coordinator was making sexual advances to the women in the WOW group? Or was refusing to get a job? That's the kind of stuff I'm talking about. Not mere personality conflicts.

Or lazy thieves

Can we define "saved'? Or "Salvation"?

Evan has put more time & thinking into this than I, but if this is the "formula", why do we never see it used anywhere in Acts?

I've never been able to understand why anyone was surprised at this letter. Wierwille never allowed the degree of dissension in the ranks that Martindale was dealing with. TWI was never run in any way other than despotic, one-man, top-down, no-argument, quasi-dictatorship. Whatever you think of the godliness of the doctrine, TWI was never a democracy, and never pretended to be. It is unrealistic to have expected that Wierwille's spiritual heir would behave in any other way than how he did

I remember them as early as 1997 or '98

No former beliefs? How did you manage that?

Hard to do, since the store i work in was not built until 1986, the first store in the chain was built in 1984 :blink:

Thanks WordWolf, you saved me the trouble :ph34r: Snopes is a great site, and they're usually right on top of the latest internet b.s. although the Lincoln-Kennedy one has been around for awhile What about this: Hmmm.... WordWolf = 8 letters Oakspear = 8 letters WordWolf - from New York Oakspear - from New York WordWolf - knows Rafael Olmeda Oakspear - drank a lot of beer with Rafael Olmeda WordWolf - was in TWI in the 80's Oakspear - was in TWI in the 80's WordWolf - provides analysis of posts by Mike Oakspear - has a brother named Mike I could go on & on ;)

Then you can settle the argument about whether the protaganist was blind, gay, or both

Without getting into a doctrinal discussion of what "renewing one's mind" is, no, I disagree. All it takes is one "psycho" in the group, and all the renewing of the mind in the world will not make the situation work out. I would agree that a group who all shared the same goals and level of maturity and committment could make it work, and many did, but the fact that many WOW groups had one or more troublemakers, or folks who were unsuited in one way or another, speaks to the inability of the "leadership" to properly run the program

For me, I had a desire to determine what the truth was. As a young man I decided that the bible was the truth, but hadn't been taught much detail about it. Followers of The Way were the first people to claim that it was even possible to read and understand the bible. "The class" seemed an easy way to check out their claims. For several sessions, Wierwille hammers home the theme that the bible is "The Revealed Word and Will of God", "The Integrity of The Word", "The God Breathed Word", etc. He reads a lot of verses, but doesn't really say anything other than "God wrote the bible, so it's true" for hours upon hours. Finally, he starts reading verses that contradict what the mainstream churches teach. "Wow", I thought, "how can the churches have missed this stuff? It's written plainly in black & white". He spends quite a while building his own credibility as someone who simply reads what's written, and the churches unreliability at the same. To me, it undermined any trust I may have had in the churches and built up Wierwille in my eyes. So far, in my opinion, he's done little that's obviously wrong, he pretty much just reads (although he's already putting his own spin on II Timothy 3:16-17 and I Peter 1:20-21) Then he starts hitting us with "the fireworks" - the "apparent contradictions". After convincing us that the bible cannot contradict itself, since it's "godbreathed", and tearing down the churches' credibility and building up his own, he starts throwing around definitions of greek words and concepts with little visible support. Reasonable posters can disagree about his doctrines, but my point is that, while being told that we could check things out for ourselves, we were being expected to accept his premises and definitions, from which his conclusions arose. I knew very few people who had any concept of "working the Word" back when I took PFAL, so there really wasn't anyone to check this stuff out with. And he had done such a thorough job of discrediting churches that I probably wouldn't have listened anyway. After getting my head filled with a bewildering array of doctrine, then we hit "the holy spirit field". Whatever one thinks of the doctrine, Wierwille was schooled in the art of preaching, and knew how to build up the excitement, culminating in the emotional speaking in tongues in session twelve. Looking back with what I know now, a lot of what Wierwille had in his class was poorly done "research", unwarranted assumptions, and biblical pretzel baking. Yet I accepted what he taught, I accepted him as an expert. By the time I could 'work the Word" on my own, I was so thoroughly indoctrinated with Wierwille's assumptions, that it was difficult to view the bible without my Way-colored glasses.

In what way do you feel "tricked" by PFAL? (Assuming that you do, of course :) ) I realize that there are extremes in opinion about "the class", some believe it's the "reissued Word of God", some feel that it's the best teaching about the bible to come down the pike, some never thought it was worth the film it was printed on. Many of us bought into PFAL, maybe warily, maybe skeptically, but we at least conditionally accepted it. Looking back from the perspective of someone who realizes that they've been scammed, how did he do it? How was the wool pulled over your eyes?