Why Are So Many People Religiously Seduced?
When I was 18-years old and in the Air Force, I heard the "World Tomorrow" broadcast on radio for the first time (about 1961). The voice on that program was either Herbert W. Armstrong or Garner Ted. They offered "FREE" literature, booklets and a "Bible Correspondence Course." I was intrigued that I could get this material for "free." I was captivated by what I heard on this radio program and so I sent for various "free" booklets and the Bible Correspondence Course. Little did I know at the time, that what I was hearing and reading was the "mind-set" of Herbert W. Armstrong and those who influenced him. I was young, gullible and naive and thought I was learning "Biblical truth." I read the material and devoured it with zeal. I was indoctrinated and programmed to believe a great deal of false doctrines and teachings, based upon Herbert W. Armstrong.
After my honorable discharge from the Air Force, I made a beeline for Pasadena and within a few months became an employee. Twelve years later, my wife and I and two children took an exit from this cult, and found great relief of mind to no longer be associated with a religious organization that controlled the lives of so many gullible and naive people and families. Many years later and thinking about it, I still wonder what it is that causes people to be seduced by man-made religions (?). Perhaps it is partly that people need social contacts, need something that is missing in their lives and find comfort in just being a part of something.
Another strange aspect is that there is something in many people, that seems to find comfort in being told what to think and what to do with their lives. Maybe it is the lack of having parents in their lives, as I did. My dad and mom divorced when my two sisters and I were very young children and we lived with our loving Dad and then he passed away early in life at about 32-years of age. We were lost sheep in the world. Perhaps it is that reason that I found comfort in the Worldwide Church of God and one of my sisters found "truth" in the Mormon Church.
Sometimes perhaps we are driven by reasons we simply don't understand, at least at the time we become involved in cults. Perhaps the need is fellowship with other people. Whatever the reason, the odd and strange thing is that in time many will exit these church groups and yet others will stay within for life. The same is true of so called "main-stream" churches. One can find on the Internet websites by ex-church goers of almost any group, including not only the Worldwide Church of God and its many clones, but also ex-Roman Catholics, ex-Mormons, ex-Jehovah Witnesses, ex-Church of Christ, ex-Seventh Day Adventists, ex-Gospel Assembly, ex-Pentecostal, ex-Charismatic, ex-Baptist or name your religious flavor or fill in the blanks.
What drives many to exit while many others never do? There are many ex-Christians who have turned to atheism. There are some former atheists who are now Christians. Indeed life is strange! Many are convinced God does not exist, while many others are totally convinced He does. Why is that? Some are Deists, meaning that they believe in God based upon observation in the world and universe, but not in revealed knowledge, such as "the Bible." And then of course there are religious beliefs outside of the realm of so called "Christianity" (which I call man-made Churchianity).
The religiously indoctrinated mind is in my opinion a closed mind, meaning that this person can only think and "reason" within the parameters or walls of their particular programming, and cannot entertain alternatives. I have found that so called Bible apologists are in this category and it would seem apparent that their house of cards comes tumbling down, unless they believe that "the Bible is infallible and inerrant." Their faith in Jesus Christ is based upon "Bible infallibility."
Perhaps one of the strangest things to contemplate is why so many people are like sheep that bah bah bah to religious leaders, thinking that these people represent God Almighty/Jesus Christ for no other reason than that they stand in pulpits and spew and spout forth their personal opinions on what "truth" is. Is it because humans are taught from birth to "obey" and to NOT THINK? It is the same with the world of politicians, politics and human governments, and none of them have the answers to human issues, human problems or represent God on earth, even though they may proclaim that they do.
I would suggest that one of the greatest weaknesses in human beings is to follow men or women who speak in public and vocalize that what they teach is what "truth" is. Millions fall prey to those who stand in pulpits. Millions fall prey to those who speak from political platforms. However, if indeed Jesus Christ is the Way, the Truth and the Life, then no one else is. Does anyone grasp this? For those who think the "apostle" Paul was God in the flesh, and infallible and inerrant, does it seem strange that in the four Gospels, Jesus NEVER mentioned the name of a man named "Paul?"
It is a great human failing to follow men who themselves will wind up kissing the grave and all the financial sacrifice to support these clowns, will wind up blowing in the wind.
Van Robison
Very well spoken Van
ReplyDeleteI was interested in science fiction: I always explored the possibilities with curiosity as a teenager -- I even built my own 24 volt DC regulated power supply and took a rack of electro mechanical relays and designed (and hard wired soldered) a binary counter out of them at the age of 12.
ReplyDeleteMy brother got interested in various fringe religions, finding the Lutherans from which we sprang, not quite satisfying. He eventually settled on the Radio Church of God. He dragged me with him.
At the tender age of 17, my dad and brother loaned me money and set me on a Greyhound Bus for an adventure in the big city and literally plunged me into cult life. I had a less than minimum crap job in a major city (having come from a very small town of 500) and in order to even survive, I was forced into captivity by having to have roommates in the church in order to survive. I lost 25 pounds in 2 years because I was starving most of the time. To reject church doctrine and not pay the tithes would have been death, even if I was barely alive.
Over the decades, I have pursued splinter after splinter and even tried independent Sabbath keeping churches. My attitude was to prove each one out to see if they lived up to what they called "the truth". Some of them are extremely weird and creepy. The rest of them are cults which treat their people fairly universally with contempt. Some are more open about contempt than others.
All have narcissistic leadership and most of the time have all the characteristics of the DSM IV Antisocial Personality Disorder -- they are either sociopaths and psychopaths.
All of them want a measure of power and respect. Most of them also want the money.
It isn't as if I haven't given each one in turn a chance: Sometimes decades, sometimes, as in the case of Wade Cox, eight months. I have always found something really major wrong with the leaders.
It is beyond disappointing. It's aggravating to find that every last one of the Armstrongist churches of God and any number of other Sabbath keeping congregations are cults and populated with nutjobs.
They all claim to have the truth.
I am still interested in the possibilities and have my subscription to Analog and Asimov's but with the Armstrongist churches of God I find they are all science fiction without the science.
I never got to know you very well while you were there, but I remember your name.
ReplyDeleteYou've summed things up pretty well. I've tried to figure out what caught me in the web. I even wrote a book about it and it is available on hwarmstrong.com.
Some aspects I understand, while others are just to complicated to figure out. We are complex creatures and no two minds work exactly the same.
Glad to see you made to freedom and I hope your life has gone well in the meantime.
For something not so completely different-
ReplyDeleteSomeone sent me a link to a short video yesterday.
Warning: Those who believe David Barton's constant barrage of lies probably should not view it.
Anyhoo, click here if you'd like to view it on youtube.
Norm
I clearly remember wanting to be a doctor of some sort. Eye doc perhaps because I have a brother who is blind, deaf and can't speak. Thought maybe I'd discover some way for him to get out into the world with so many senses lost.
ReplyDeleteThen I heard WCG talk about "the deaf will hear, the blind will see andt he lame shall leap as a hart." I switched to wanting to teach that message which sounded so amazingly hopeful and thus I became a minister.
I had been accepted by the Roberts Wesylian College in Rochester, but hadn't heard from AC yet where I thought I really wanted to go due to the message, not the personalities. I called AC and told them either accept me now or I'm gone. They said "Ok, you're in"
Shoot me! ha
I knew I wanted to work with machinery at a very early age. My childhood and adolescence were an endless string of taking things apart (and sometimes actually getting them put back together) for the pure joy of seeing how they work.
ReplyDeleteBut, alas. For young people being raised in WCG, square peg in round hole or not, if one had the intellect, Ambassador College was seen as being the total and only acceptable educational solution. I followed the path of least resistance and went when accepted. However, it was a most uncomfortable fit, and I acted out grievously until attracting sufficient negative attention (kicked out after two years), and finally ended up at AC Press, at last working with the machines I loved.
In retrospect, WCG was something I got dragged into by my parents. Some people are "joiners", others are not because they value independence. I fall into the latter category. Had I been an adult and heard HWA's apocalyptic message on my own, I probably would have treated it just as I did as a "second generation" member. I would have been very conflicted over it, and simply worried when I occasionally thought about it, yet not allowing it to influence my level of participation or enthusiasm. That's pretty much my pattern with regard to the half dozen existential threats with which humanity is confronted today. Fear marketing does not work as a motivator for me.
I also didn't fall for the "we have special precious knowledge which you are very privileged to be hearing" shtick. To me, WCG appeared to be a system of rigid do's and don't's, with a harsh judgmental team of ministerial enforcers who reported directly to a harsh judgmental god. They touted the thoroughness and accuracy of the research through which they supported their beliefs, but if one broke protocol and investigated more deeply, one found that they had cherry-picked, distorted and even blatantly lied where they assumed they could not get caught. This, I learned, is true of all cults, and of the cult mentality.
The essence of a spiritual experience is a personal relationship with God, unspoiled by the interference of man. Independent study and digestion of ideas, becoming a slave to righteousness rather than a slave to evil, but, never again placing some sort of aspiring guru or his systematized beliefs between myself and God.
BB
I would circle plants. I think God loves plants the most. Does anyone have the teacher's edition that says what the right answer is?
ReplyDelete