What Is a Cult?
© 1990 by Bob and Gretchen Passantino.
Drums beat in uneven syncopation. Exotic spices and incense fill the air with the swirling fragrance of another world. Red and gold silk glints in the flickering light. Dorothy feels her heart hammer against her chest, her throat so dry she can't swallow. She feels immobile against the panic that rises to cloud her vision. Dorothy is at the Hare Krishna temple to rescue her daughter, Shelly, from a cult. Never has she counted on the power of her faith in Christ as she did now, confronted by the temple leader, who abruptly tells her Shelly is gone, lost forever to her family and former Christian faith, dedicated to the worship and service of Krishna.
Later, as Dorothy shared her pain with her Bible study, she was met with a cacophany of opinions. "How could such a good girl have become such a deceiver? You know all those cults are just out for money and power." "How can you be so judgmental, Dorothy? She's just doing what's meaningful for her." "Those cults -- they're all into human sacrifices and mind control." "I talked to a Hare Krishna once and she said she believed in Jesus -- what's wrong with that?" Dorothy didn't know what to think. She had to find answers.
Dorothy is like a lot of Christians who hardly think about cults or other belief systems until someone they love becomes entangled in a faith that at odds with Christianity. Many times, the loved one is involved in a group that is much less obviously different than the Hare Krishnas. Frequently family members vacilate between thinking, on the one hand, the group is just another kind of Christianity or, on the other hand, the group must be a cult from the pit of hell. Dorothy and other concerned Christians need a clear understanding of what a cult is to begin their education.
Unfortunately, when Christians attempt to find out what a cult is, they discover that there are almost as many definitions of a cult as there are writers and speakers on the subject. Sociologists often define cults by their cultural idiosyncracies. Psychologists frequently talk about cults in terms of "mind control," "low self-esteem," "dominating leadership," etc. Journalists seem to describe cults in terms like bizarre, suicidal, secretive, and fanatical. Within the Christian church these variations sometimes are coupled with strong religious pronouncements that any group other than their own denomination is a cult, or some assume that any faith is better than no faith and think the term is always pejorative and should never be used by a Christian.
In the midst of this confusion of opinion, there is a core of biblical clarity that can help concerned Christians discern between truth and error, biblical standards and opinion. The term cult comes from the Latin cultus, meaning "worship," and originally meant a system of worship distinguishable from others. It quickly came to mean an aberrant form of worship identified in some way with a "parent" belief system. So, for example, the "mystery cults" of Greece and Rome were sectarian systems of worship of one or more of the pantheon of Greek and Roman gods and goddesses. According to this early definition, Christianity could be considered a "cult" of Judaism, deriving its identify from the Jewish faith, but differing from first century Judaism in its proclamation of Jesus as the Messiah, the resurrected Son of God.
In this century, the Church has usually defined the term cult by doctrinal or theological standards. In this sense, a cult is a sectarian religious group that identifies itself with Christianity and yet fails one or more core doctrinal tests of orthodoxy. Jehovah's Witnesses, for example, call themselves Christians, and yet deny the doctrine of the Trinity and the deity and resurreciton of Christ, among other doctrinal distinctives. The Mormons identify themselves as members of "The Church of Jesus Christ," but affirm the elevation of man to godhood and deny salvation by grace alone, as well as other doctrines contrary to biblical teachings. Most Christian cult watchers understand this doctrinal definition as contrasting the cult's beliefs with essential biblical doctrine concerning five areas: God (belief in one true God, the trinity, God's infinite and eternal nature and attributes, etc.); Jesus Christ (Second Person of the trinity, virgin born, died on the cross for us, resurrection, Second Coming, etc.); man (created in God's image, morally responsible, destined either for eternal life or eternal punishment, etc.); sin and salvation (all people are sinful and separated from God, salvation is by grace alone through faith, the atonement, etc.); and scripture (the Bible, Old and New Testaments, is God's infallible Word and the revelation from God by which we understand, worship, and serve God). A cult, then, is a religious group that identifies itself with Christianity, or at least claims compatibility with Christianity, and yet which denies one or more of these cardinal biblical doctrines.
Sociological, psychological, and journalistic observations sometimes show us the human dynamics that frequently result from a cult belief system, but they are not sufficient Christian foundations for determining a groups status as a cult. For example, a cult's unique doctrines can lead to an exclusivism and separateness from other religious groups. A cult's belief that the Bible's revelation is superceded by the current revelations of the cult leader may result in followers surrendering their thinking and decision making abilities to the cult leader. And the more aberrant a cult's beliefs and practices, the more likely it is to be characterized as bizarre.
Once Dorothy learned to identify a cult, she perused Hare Krishna literature and talked with the temple representative. She learned that, while Hare Krishnas say they believe in Jesus, they believe he was only one manifestation of Krishna, certainly not the unique Son of God manifest in the flesh. She learned their statement of compatibility with Christianity masked their conviction that Christianity is a low, spiritually ignorant groping after religious experience only attainable through devotion to Krishna. She discovered the Hare Krishna's polytheism (belief in the existence of more than one god) and salvation through an elaborate and multi-life (reincarnation) karmic system of works.
Dorothy located her daughter and arranged a meeting. Dorothy used 2 Timothy 2:24-26 as her pattern for confrontation: "And the Lord's servant must not quarrel; instead, he must gently instruct, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will" (NIV). Dorothy knew not to argue with Shelly. She quietly asked Shelly to explain her beliefs, and then Dorothy explained her own biblical concerns with Shelly's faith. She continued to affirm her love for Shelly as she shared her disagreements with her. Her careful Bible study and research into Krishna teachings prepared gave enabled her to share confidently and clearly. She realized Shelly had been deceived, and she prayed for God to open her eyes. Gently and lovingly she shared the biblical gospel with Shelly, echoing Paul's confidence: "I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes" (Romans 1:16). Shelly didn't leave the Krishnas that morning, but Dorothy has hope. As Shelly left, she asked her mother to pray for her.
[For further information on cults and definitions of "cult," see Bob and Gretchen Passantino's two books Answers to the Cultist at Your Door (Harvest House) and Witch Hunt (Thomas Nelson), as well as Dr. Walter Martin's Kingdom of the Cults (Bethany House) and Walter Martin Speaks Out on the Cults (Regal).]
When They Come Knocking . . . .
"I want you to write a book on the cults to help my wife," the publisher explained. "She loves the Lord, but she needs a book that makes her confident enough that she'll thank God she answered the door to the Jehovah's Witnesses, instead of thanking God she was in the shower and didn't hear the doorbell." That publisher's wife echoed the fears of many Christians who want to share their faith with cultists, but don't know how. In the almost two decades we've spent witnessing to cultists, and the decade since publication of our Answers to the Cultist at Your Door (Harvest House), the Lord has given us hundreds of opportunities to observe and participate in witnessing successes and failures. God has taught us to "always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have" (1 Peter 3:15 NIV). He has taught us that our delusions of argumentation grandeur do nothing to bring cultists to the truth; God gives the increase (1 Corinthians 3:7).
At the core of successful witnessing to the cults is commitment to God's pattern of evangelism: "And the Lord's servant must not quarrel; instead, he must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. Those who oppose him he must gently instruct, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will" (2 Timothy 2:24-26). This combines a heart for people lost in darkness, along with a commitment to solid reasons for biblical faith. This combination heart/head technique provides the Christian with confidence and the cultist with the best opportunity to hear and respond to the truth of the gospel.
Our publisher's wife began with her compassionate heart, aching for those deceived by false belief. She was eager for them to know Jesus as their Savior. She didn't view cultists as devils, enemies, or hopelessly spiritually insane; but instead as sincere but deceived individuals for whom Christ had died. The vast majority of cultists we have met, caught in sin like all humanity, are kind, sincere people who believe they are worshipping and serving God. Unless a Christian can have empathy and identify with the cultist, successful witnessing will be elusive. Several years ago one of our new interns, Greg, learned this lesson quickly. He came with four years of Bible college knowledge about the cults. As he told us, "I'm ready to trounce those cultists!" He accompanied us as we witnessed to a woman who had been a Jehovah's Witness for most of her life. While our encounter centered around biblical truth concerning the trinity, the deity of Christ, and salvation by grace, the woman's main concern was more personal. She saw the truth of our arguments, but she was afraid to believe. She told us tearfully, "If I've been deceived for thirty years, how can I know for sure this is right? What if I'm wrong and Jehovah rejects me for all eternity?" After assurance and further conversation, the woman prayed with us to receive Christ. We rejoiced on the way home, but Greg was strangely silent. Finally he confessed, "I feel like a fool. Here I had all this head knowledge but I had no idea Jehovah's Witnesses were real people. I would have completely turned her off by my accusations and rebukes. Thank God you guys were doing the talking!"
When you talk with a cultist, remember that he or she is just like you were before you became a believer, with the same dreams, hopes, doubts, and fears:
1. Treat the cultist as you would like to be treated (the "Golden Rule" of cult apologetics).
2. Even if you don't have all the answers, your compassion, genuine interest, and willingness to look for the answers will encourage the cultist to take your words seriously.
3. Be sure to separate the deception of the cult from the sincerity of the cultist, who sincerely believes what he or she has been taught.
4. Stress the positives the cultist will gain from biblical repentance and faith, rather than continuously focusing on the negatives of cult belief. (One Mormon asked us, "So, even if you're right about the Mormon Church, what else is there for me?")
Christians who have plenty of "heart" but not much "head" need to concentrate on the facts of biblical faith for successful communication with cultists. God has given us the ability to think, reason, and evaluate as part of our being made in God's image. Although we often make mistakes in our thinking due to our inherent sinfulness, God commands us to use our minds as part of good evangelism: "Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth" (2 Timothy 2:15). When our publisher's wife became adequately prepared in her Bible knowledge as well as her understanding of cult doctrines, she was able to greet cultists with a clear message of biblical truth.
1. Learn basic Christian doctrine. There is no substitute for truth. The best way to recognize a counterfeit is to be familiar with the genuine.
2. Concentrate on core biblical doctrines, those concerning God, Jesus Christ, the nature of man, sin and salvation, and scripture. Peripheral doctrines such as the timing of the Second Coming or modes of baptism are not essential for salvation.
3. Carefully evaluate your own vocabulary and that of the cultist. Be sure you are communicating clearly. For example, Christians understand the term "Son of God" to affirm the deity of Christ; Jehovah's Witnesses use the same term, but mean "the Mighty creation by God."
4. Always include a clear presentation of the gospel. The death, burial, and resurrection of Christ on our behalf, according to the scriptures (1 Corinthians 15:1-4) is the power of God for salvation (Romans 1:16). It is irresponsible to destroy a cultist's beliefs without sharing how to be saved.
5. Don't assume you know what the cultist believes. Show personal interest by asking him to tell you what he believes. Then answer biblically.
6. Consult responsible Christian sources for information about what the cults teach and how to answer them from scripture. The wealth of good Christian material means you don't need to read cult publications or Christian publications that are not well-referenced and theologically sound.
We received a call from a woman who had attended one of our training sessions on witnessing to cultists. She was so excited we asked her to slow down. "I did it! I did it!" She laughed, "I mean, the Lord did it! And boy did He do it! I'm so excited! I've been studying and praying for a month for one of my employees who's a Jehovah's Witness. I never knew what to say to her, but I learned, and this morning we talked for three hours. I can't believe it! She saw the truth and prayed with me right then to accept Christ! This is fantastic!" We rejoiced with her, praising God for giving the increase and thanking Him for giving us hearts and minds to be used by the Holy Spirit to reach those lost in the cults.
For Further Help
When you are faced with a loved one in a cult, or you don't know how to share your faith with a cultist you know or who approaches you, you can find specific help from many different organizations dedicated to sharing the gospel with the cults. There are nearly 700 organizations worldwide engaged in research and evangelism of the cults, the occult, and world religions. Some are very small, volunteer organizations; some support large, professional staffs. Some charge for basic services, some don't. Some tackle many different belief systems and some are dedicated to evangelizing one particular cult or belief (e.g., Mormonism, reincarnation, etc.).
The Directory of Cult Research Organizations lists 652 of these cult research organizations and is an invaluable resource for pastors, church leaders, teachers, and Christians who are concerned with evangelizing cultists. It is available for $6.00 (plus $2.00 shipping) from Cornerstone, 920 W. Wilson, Chicago, IL 60640, telephone (312) 989-2080.
When you contact any organization, be sure to include a stamped, self-addressed business size envelope. If you request materials, be prepared to pay and thoughtfully include an adequate donation. Non-profit organizations often have very limited budgets.
In addition to the Directory, information is available from the cult research organization coalition, Evangelical Ministries to New Religions (EMNR). EMNR provides networking, conferences, and acts as a clearing house for cult research organizations. You may contact EMNR by writing Bob Passantino, Executive Director, EMNR, P.O. Box 2067, Costa Mesa, CA 92628.
Recommended Cult Research Organizations
Previous Article · copyright notice · Next Article
Answers In Action
P.O. Box 2067
Costa Mesa, California 92628
(949) 646-9042
Answers In Action c/o aia@answers.org
Showing posts with label CULTS. Show all posts
Showing posts with label CULTS. Show all posts
Monday, April 27, 2009
CULTS
What Is a Cult?
© 1990 by Bob and Gretchen Passantino.
Drums beat in uneven syncopation. Exotic spices and incense fill the air with the swirling fragrance of another world. Red and gold silk glints in the flickering light. Dorothy feels her heart hammer against her chest, her throat so dry she can't swallow. She feels immobile against the panic that rises to cloud her vision. Dorothy is at the Hare Krishna temple to rescue her daughter, Shelly, from a cult. Never has she counted on the power of her faith in Christ as she did now, confronted by the temple leader, who abruptly tells her Shelly is gone, lost forever to her family and former Christian faith, dedicated to the worship and service of Krishna.
Later, as Dorothy shared her pain with her Bible study, she was met with a cacophany of opinions. "How could such a good girl have become such a deceiver? You know all those cults are just out for money and power." "How can you be so judgmental, Dorothy? She's just doing what's meaningful for her." "Those cults -- they're all into human sacrifices and mind control." "I talked to a Hare Krishna once and she said she believed in Jesus -- what's wrong with that?" Dorothy didn't know what to think. She had to find answers.
Dorothy is like a lot of Christians who hardly think about cults or other belief systems until someone they love becomes entangled in a faith that at odds with Christianity. Many times, the loved one is involved in a group that is much less obviously different than the Hare Krishnas. Frequently family members vacilate between thinking, on the one hand, the group is just another kind of Christianity or, on the other hand, the group must be a cult from the pit of hell. Dorothy and other concerned Christians need a clear understanding of what a cult is to begin their education.
Unfortunately, when Christians attempt to find out what a cult is, they discover that there are almost as many definitions of a cult as there are writers and speakers on the subject. Sociologists often define cults by their cultural idiosyncracies. Psychologists frequently talk about cults in terms of "mind control," "low self-esteem," "dominating leadership," etc. Journalists seem to describe cults in terms like bizarre, suicidal, secretive, and fanatical. Within the Christian church these variations sometimes are coupled with strong religious pronouncements that any group other than their own denomination is a cult, or some assume that any faith is better than no faith and think the term is always pejorative and should never be used by a Christian.
In the midst of this confusion of opinion, there is a core of biblical clarity that can help concerned Christians discern between truth and error, biblical standards and opinion. The term cult comes from the Latin cultus, meaning "worship," and originally meant a system of worship distinguishable from others. It quickly came to mean an aberrant form of worship identified in some way with a "parent" belief system. So, for example, the "mystery cults" of Greece and Rome were sectarian systems of worship of one or more of the pantheon of Greek and Roman gods and goddesses. According to this early definition, Christianity could be considered a "cult" of Judaism, deriving its identify from the Jewish faith, but differing from first century Judaism in its proclamation of Jesus as the Messiah, the resurrected Son of God.
In this century, the Church has usually defined the term cult by doctrinal or theological standards. In this sense, a cult is a sectarian religious group that identifies itself with Christianity and yet fails one or more core doctrinal tests of orthodoxy. Jehovah's Witnesses, for example, call themselves Christians, and yet deny the doctrine of the Trinity and the deity and resurreciton of Christ, among other doctrinal distinctives. The Mormons identify themselves as members of "The Church of Jesus Christ," but affirm the elevation of man to godhood and deny salvation by grace alone, as well as other doctrines contrary to biblical teachings. Most Christian cult watchers understand this doctrinal definition as contrasting the cult's beliefs with essential biblical doctrine concerning five areas: God (belief in one true God, the trinity, God's infinite and eternal nature and attributes, etc.); Jesus Christ (Second Person of the trinity, virgin born, died on the cross for us, resurrection, Second Coming, etc.); man (created in God's image, morally responsible, destined either for eternal life or eternal punishment, etc.); sin and salvation (all people are sinful and separated from God, salvation is by grace alone through faith, the atonement, etc.); and scripture (the Bible, Old and New Testaments, is God's infallible Word and the revelation from God by which we understand, worship, and serve God). A cult, then, is a religious group that identifies itself with Christianity, or at least claims compatibility with Christianity, and yet which denies one or more of these cardinal biblical doctrines.
Sociological, psychological, and journalistic observations sometimes show us the human dynamics that frequently result from a cult belief system, but they are not sufficient Christian foundations for determining a groups status as a cult. For example, a cult's unique doctrines can lead to an exclusivism and separateness from other religious groups. A cult's belief that the Bible's revelation is superceded by the current revelations of the cult leader may result in followers surrendering their thinking and decision making abilities to the cult leader. And the more aberrant a cult's beliefs and practices, the more likely it is to be characterized as bizarre.
Once Dorothy learned to identify a cult, she perused Hare Krishna literature and talked with the temple representative. She learned that, while Hare Krishnas say they believe in Jesus, they believe he was only one manifestation of Krishna, certainly not the unique Son of God manifest in the flesh. She learned their statement of compatibility with Christianity masked their conviction that Christianity is a low, spiritually ignorant groping after religious experience only attainable through devotion to Krishna. She discovered the Hare Krishna's polytheism (belief in the existence of more than one god) and salvation through an elaborate and multi-life (reincarnation) karmic system of works.
Dorothy located her daughter and arranged a meeting. Dorothy used 2 Timothy 2:24-26 as her pattern for confrontation: "And the Lord's servant must not quarrel; instead, he must gently instruct, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will" (NIV). Dorothy knew not to argue with Shelly. She quietly asked Shelly to explain her beliefs, and then Dorothy explained her own biblical concerns with Shelly's faith. She continued to affirm her love for Shelly as she shared her disagreements with her. Her careful Bible study and research into Krishna teachings prepared gave enabled her to share confidently and clearly. She realized Shelly had been deceived, and she prayed for God to open her eyes. Gently and lovingly she shared the biblical gospel with Shelly, echoing Paul's confidence: "I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes" (Romans 1:16). Shelly didn't leave the Krishnas that morning, but Dorothy has hope. As Shelly left, she asked her mother to pray for her.
[For further information on cults and definitions of "cult," see Bob and Gretchen Passantino's two books Answers to the Cultist at Your Door (Harvest House) and Witch Hunt (Thomas Nelson), as well as Dr. Walter Martin's Kingdom of the Cults (Bethany House) and Walter Martin Speaks Out on the Cults (Regal).]
When They Come Knocking . . . .
"I want you to write a book on the cults to help my wife," the publisher explained. "She loves the Lord, but she needs a book that makes her confident enough that she'll thank God she answered the door to the Jehovah's Witnesses, instead of thanking God she was in the shower and didn't hear the doorbell." That publisher's wife echoed the fears of many Christians who want to share their faith with cultists, but don't know how. In the almost two decades we've spent witnessing to cultists, and the decade since publication of our Answers to the Cultist at Your Door (Harvest House), the Lord has given us hundreds of opportunities to observe and participate in witnessing successes and failures. God has taught us to "always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have" (1 Peter 3:15 NIV). He has taught us that our delusions of argumentation grandeur do nothing to bring cultists to the truth; God gives the increase (1 Corinthians 3:7).
At the core of successful witnessing to the cults is commitment to God's pattern of evangelism: "And the Lord's servant must not quarrel; instead, he must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. Those who oppose him he must gently instruct, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will" (2 Timothy 2:24-26). This combines a heart for people lost in darkness, along with a commitment to solid reasons for biblical faith. This combination heart/head technique provides the Christian with confidence and the cultist with the best opportunity to hear and respond to the truth of the gospel.
Our publisher's wife began with her compassionate heart, aching for those deceived by false belief. She was eager for them to know Jesus as their Savior. She didn't view cultists as devils, enemies, or hopelessly spiritually insane; but instead as sincere but deceived individuals for whom Christ had died. The vast majority of cultists we have met, caught in sin like all humanity, are kind, sincere people who believe they are worshipping and serving God. Unless a Christian can have empathy and identify with the cultist, successful witnessing will be elusive. Several years ago one of our new interns, Greg, learned this lesson quickly. He came with four years of Bible college knowledge about the cults. As he told us, "I'm ready to trounce those cultists!" He accompanied us as we witnessed to a woman who had been a Jehovah's Witness for most of her life. While our encounter centered around biblical truth concerning the trinity, the deity of Christ, and salvation by grace, the woman's main concern was more personal. She saw the truth of our arguments, but she was afraid to believe. She told us tearfully, "If I've been deceived for thirty years, how can I know for sure this is right? What if I'm wrong and Jehovah rejects me for all eternity?" After assurance and further conversation, the woman prayed with us to receive Christ. We rejoiced on the way home, but Greg was strangely silent. Finally he confessed, "I feel like a fool. Here I had all this head knowledge but I had no idea Jehovah's Witnesses were real people. I would have completely turned her off by my accusations and rebukes. Thank God you guys were doing the talking!"
When you talk with a cultist, remember that he or she is just like you were before you became a believer, with the same dreams, hopes, doubts, and fears:
1. Treat the cultist as you would like to be treated (the "Golden Rule" of cult apologetics).
2. Even if you don't have all the answers, your compassion, genuine interest, and willingness to look for the answers will encourage the cultist to take your words seriously.
3. Be sure to separate the deception of the cult from the sincerity of the cultist, who sincerely believes what he or she has been taught.
4. Stress the positives the cultist will gain from biblical repentance and faith, rather than continuously focusing on the negatives of cult belief. (One Mormon asked us, "So, even if you're right about the Mormon Church, what else is there for me?")
Christians who have plenty of "heart" but not much "head" need to concentrate on the facts of biblical faith for successful communication with cultists. God has given us the ability to think, reason, and evaluate as part of our being made in God's image. Although we often make mistakes in our thinking due to our inherent sinfulness, God commands us to use our minds as part of good evangelism: "Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth" (2 Timothy 2:15). When our publisher's wife became adequately prepared in her Bible knowledge as well as her understanding of cult doctrines, she was able to greet cultists with a clear message of biblical truth.
1. Learn basic Christian doctrine. There is no substitute for truth. The best way to recognize a counterfeit is to be familiar with the genuine.
2. Concentrate on core biblical doctrines, those concerning God, Jesus Christ, the nature of man, sin and salvation, and scripture. Peripheral doctrines such as the timing of the Second Coming or modes of baptism are not essential for salvation.
3. Carefully evaluate your own vocabulary and that of the cultist. Be sure you are communicating clearly. For example, Christians understand the term "Son of God" to affirm the deity of Christ; Jehovah's Witnesses use the same term, but mean "the Mighty creation by God."
4. Always include a clear presentation of the gospel. The death, burial, and resurrection of Christ on our behalf, according to the scriptures (1 Corinthians 15:1-4) is the power of God for salvation (Romans 1:16). It is irresponsible to destroy a cultist's beliefs without sharing how to be saved.
5. Don't assume you know what the cultist believes. Show personal interest by asking him to tell you what he believes. Then answer biblically.
6. Consult responsible Christian sources for information about what the cults teach and how to answer them from scripture. The wealth of good Christian material means you don't need to read cult publications or Christian publications that are not well-referenced and theologically sound.
We received a call from a woman who had attended one of our training sessions on witnessing to cultists. She was so excited we asked her to slow down. "I did it! I did it!" She laughed, "I mean, the Lord did it! And boy did He do it! I'm so excited! I've been studying and praying for a month for one of my employees who's a Jehovah's Witness. I never knew what to say to her, but I learned, and this morning we talked for three hours. I can't believe it! She saw the truth and prayed with me right then to accept Christ! This is fantastic!" We rejoiced with her, praising God for giving the increase and thanking Him for giving us hearts and minds to be used by the Holy Spirit to reach those lost in the cults.
For Further Help
When you are faced with a loved one in a cult, or you don't know how to share your faith with a cultist you know or who approaches you, you can find specific help from many different organizations dedicated to sharing the gospel with the cults. There are nearly 700 organizations worldwide engaged in research and evangelism of the cults, the occult, and world religions. Some are very small, volunteer organizations; some support large, professional staffs. Some charge for basic services, some don't. Some tackle many different belief systems and some are dedicated to evangelizing one particular cult or belief (e.g., Mormonism, reincarnation, etc.).
The Directory of Cult Research Organizations lists 652 of these cult research organizations and is an invaluable resource for pastors, church leaders, teachers, and Christians who are concerned with evangelizing cultists. It is available for $6.00 (plus $2.00 shipping) from Cornerstone, 920 W. Wilson, Chicago, IL 60640, telephone (312) 989-2080.
When you contact any organization, be sure to include a stamped, self-addressed business size envelope. If you request materials, be prepared to pay and thoughtfully include an adequate donation. Non-profit organizations often have very limited budgets.
In addition to the Directory, information is available from the cult research organization coalition, Evangelical Ministries to New Religions (EMNR). EMNR provides networking, conferences, and acts as a clearing house for cult research organizations. You may contact EMNR by writing Bob Passantino, Executive Director, EMNR, P.O. Box 2067, Costa Mesa, CA 92628.
Recommended Cult Research Organizations
Previous Article · copyright notice · Next Article
Answers In Action
P.O. Box 2067
Costa Mesa, California 92628
(949) 646-9042
Answers In Action c/o aia@answers.org
© 1990 by Bob and Gretchen Passantino.
Drums beat in uneven syncopation. Exotic spices and incense fill the air with the swirling fragrance of another world. Red and gold silk glints in the flickering light. Dorothy feels her heart hammer against her chest, her throat so dry she can't swallow. She feels immobile against the panic that rises to cloud her vision. Dorothy is at the Hare Krishna temple to rescue her daughter, Shelly, from a cult. Never has she counted on the power of her faith in Christ as she did now, confronted by the temple leader, who abruptly tells her Shelly is gone, lost forever to her family and former Christian faith, dedicated to the worship and service of Krishna.
Later, as Dorothy shared her pain with her Bible study, she was met with a cacophany of opinions. "How could such a good girl have become such a deceiver? You know all those cults are just out for money and power." "How can you be so judgmental, Dorothy? She's just doing what's meaningful for her." "Those cults -- they're all into human sacrifices and mind control." "I talked to a Hare Krishna once and she said she believed in Jesus -- what's wrong with that?" Dorothy didn't know what to think. She had to find answers.
Dorothy is like a lot of Christians who hardly think about cults or other belief systems until someone they love becomes entangled in a faith that at odds with Christianity. Many times, the loved one is involved in a group that is much less obviously different than the Hare Krishnas. Frequently family members vacilate between thinking, on the one hand, the group is just another kind of Christianity or, on the other hand, the group must be a cult from the pit of hell. Dorothy and other concerned Christians need a clear understanding of what a cult is to begin their education.
Unfortunately, when Christians attempt to find out what a cult is, they discover that there are almost as many definitions of a cult as there are writers and speakers on the subject. Sociologists often define cults by their cultural idiosyncracies. Psychologists frequently talk about cults in terms of "mind control," "low self-esteem," "dominating leadership," etc. Journalists seem to describe cults in terms like bizarre, suicidal, secretive, and fanatical. Within the Christian church these variations sometimes are coupled with strong religious pronouncements that any group other than their own denomination is a cult, or some assume that any faith is better than no faith and think the term is always pejorative and should never be used by a Christian.
In the midst of this confusion of opinion, there is a core of biblical clarity that can help concerned Christians discern between truth and error, biblical standards and opinion. The term cult comes from the Latin cultus, meaning "worship," and originally meant a system of worship distinguishable from others. It quickly came to mean an aberrant form of worship identified in some way with a "parent" belief system. So, for example, the "mystery cults" of Greece and Rome were sectarian systems of worship of one or more of the pantheon of Greek and Roman gods and goddesses. According to this early definition, Christianity could be considered a "cult" of Judaism, deriving its identify from the Jewish faith, but differing from first century Judaism in its proclamation of Jesus as the Messiah, the resurrected Son of God.
In this century, the Church has usually defined the term cult by doctrinal or theological standards. In this sense, a cult is a sectarian religious group that identifies itself with Christianity and yet fails one or more core doctrinal tests of orthodoxy. Jehovah's Witnesses, for example, call themselves Christians, and yet deny the doctrine of the Trinity and the deity and resurreciton of Christ, among other doctrinal distinctives. The Mormons identify themselves as members of "The Church of Jesus Christ," but affirm the elevation of man to godhood and deny salvation by grace alone, as well as other doctrines contrary to biblical teachings. Most Christian cult watchers understand this doctrinal definition as contrasting the cult's beliefs with essential biblical doctrine concerning five areas: God (belief in one true God, the trinity, God's infinite and eternal nature and attributes, etc.); Jesus Christ (Second Person of the trinity, virgin born, died on the cross for us, resurrection, Second Coming, etc.); man (created in God's image, morally responsible, destined either for eternal life or eternal punishment, etc.); sin and salvation (all people are sinful and separated from God, salvation is by grace alone through faith, the atonement, etc.); and scripture (the Bible, Old and New Testaments, is God's infallible Word and the revelation from God by which we understand, worship, and serve God). A cult, then, is a religious group that identifies itself with Christianity, or at least claims compatibility with Christianity, and yet which denies one or more of these cardinal biblical doctrines.
Sociological, psychological, and journalistic observations sometimes show us the human dynamics that frequently result from a cult belief system, but they are not sufficient Christian foundations for determining a groups status as a cult. For example, a cult's unique doctrines can lead to an exclusivism and separateness from other religious groups. A cult's belief that the Bible's revelation is superceded by the current revelations of the cult leader may result in followers surrendering their thinking and decision making abilities to the cult leader. And the more aberrant a cult's beliefs and practices, the more likely it is to be characterized as bizarre.
Once Dorothy learned to identify a cult, she perused Hare Krishna literature and talked with the temple representative. She learned that, while Hare Krishnas say they believe in Jesus, they believe he was only one manifestation of Krishna, certainly not the unique Son of God manifest in the flesh. She learned their statement of compatibility with Christianity masked their conviction that Christianity is a low, spiritually ignorant groping after religious experience only attainable through devotion to Krishna. She discovered the Hare Krishna's polytheism (belief in the existence of more than one god) and salvation through an elaborate and multi-life (reincarnation) karmic system of works.
Dorothy located her daughter and arranged a meeting. Dorothy used 2 Timothy 2:24-26 as her pattern for confrontation: "And the Lord's servant must not quarrel; instead, he must gently instruct, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will" (NIV). Dorothy knew not to argue with Shelly. She quietly asked Shelly to explain her beliefs, and then Dorothy explained her own biblical concerns with Shelly's faith. She continued to affirm her love for Shelly as she shared her disagreements with her. Her careful Bible study and research into Krishna teachings prepared gave enabled her to share confidently and clearly. She realized Shelly had been deceived, and she prayed for God to open her eyes. Gently and lovingly she shared the biblical gospel with Shelly, echoing Paul's confidence: "I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes" (Romans 1:16). Shelly didn't leave the Krishnas that morning, but Dorothy has hope. As Shelly left, she asked her mother to pray for her.
[For further information on cults and definitions of "cult," see Bob and Gretchen Passantino's two books Answers to the Cultist at Your Door (Harvest House) and Witch Hunt (Thomas Nelson), as well as Dr. Walter Martin's Kingdom of the Cults (Bethany House) and Walter Martin Speaks Out on the Cults (Regal).]
When They Come Knocking . . . .
"I want you to write a book on the cults to help my wife," the publisher explained. "She loves the Lord, but she needs a book that makes her confident enough that she'll thank God she answered the door to the Jehovah's Witnesses, instead of thanking God she was in the shower and didn't hear the doorbell." That publisher's wife echoed the fears of many Christians who want to share their faith with cultists, but don't know how. In the almost two decades we've spent witnessing to cultists, and the decade since publication of our Answers to the Cultist at Your Door (Harvest House), the Lord has given us hundreds of opportunities to observe and participate in witnessing successes and failures. God has taught us to "always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have" (1 Peter 3:15 NIV). He has taught us that our delusions of argumentation grandeur do nothing to bring cultists to the truth; God gives the increase (1 Corinthians 3:7).
At the core of successful witnessing to the cults is commitment to God's pattern of evangelism: "And the Lord's servant must not quarrel; instead, he must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. Those who oppose him he must gently instruct, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will" (2 Timothy 2:24-26). This combines a heart for people lost in darkness, along with a commitment to solid reasons for biblical faith. This combination heart/head technique provides the Christian with confidence and the cultist with the best opportunity to hear and respond to the truth of the gospel.
Our publisher's wife began with her compassionate heart, aching for those deceived by false belief. She was eager for them to know Jesus as their Savior. She didn't view cultists as devils, enemies, or hopelessly spiritually insane; but instead as sincere but deceived individuals for whom Christ had died. The vast majority of cultists we have met, caught in sin like all humanity, are kind, sincere people who believe they are worshipping and serving God. Unless a Christian can have empathy and identify with the cultist, successful witnessing will be elusive. Several years ago one of our new interns, Greg, learned this lesson quickly. He came with four years of Bible college knowledge about the cults. As he told us, "I'm ready to trounce those cultists!" He accompanied us as we witnessed to a woman who had been a Jehovah's Witness for most of her life. While our encounter centered around biblical truth concerning the trinity, the deity of Christ, and salvation by grace, the woman's main concern was more personal. She saw the truth of our arguments, but she was afraid to believe. She told us tearfully, "If I've been deceived for thirty years, how can I know for sure this is right? What if I'm wrong and Jehovah rejects me for all eternity?" After assurance and further conversation, the woman prayed with us to receive Christ. We rejoiced on the way home, but Greg was strangely silent. Finally he confessed, "I feel like a fool. Here I had all this head knowledge but I had no idea Jehovah's Witnesses were real people. I would have completely turned her off by my accusations and rebukes. Thank God you guys were doing the talking!"
When you talk with a cultist, remember that he or she is just like you were before you became a believer, with the same dreams, hopes, doubts, and fears:
1. Treat the cultist as you would like to be treated (the "Golden Rule" of cult apologetics).
2. Even if you don't have all the answers, your compassion, genuine interest, and willingness to look for the answers will encourage the cultist to take your words seriously.
3. Be sure to separate the deception of the cult from the sincerity of the cultist, who sincerely believes what he or she has been taught.
4. Stress the positives the cultist will gain from biblical repentance and faith, rather than continuously focusing on the negatives of cult belief. (One Mormon asked us, "So, even if you're right about the Mormon Church, what else is there for me?")
Christians who have plenty of "heart" but not much "head" need to concentrate on the facts of biblical faith for successful communication with cultists. God has given us the ability to think, reason, and evaluate as part of our being made in God's image. Although we often make mistakes in our thinking due to our inherent sinfulness, God commands us to use our minds as part of good evangelism: "Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth" (2 Timothy 2:15). When our publisher's wife became adequately prepared in her Bible knowledge as well as her understanding of cult doctrines, she was able to greet cultists with a clear message of biblical truth.
1. Learn basic Christian doctrine. There is no substitute for truth. The best way to recognize a counterfeit is to be familiar with the genuine.
2. Concentrate on core biblical doctrines, those concerning God, Jesus Christ, the nature of man, sin and salvation, and scripture. Peripheral doctrines such as the timing of the Second Coming or modes of baptism are not essential for salvation.
3. Carefully evaluate your own vocabulary and that of the cultist. Be sure you are communicating clearly. For example, Christians understand the term "Son of God" to affirm the deity of Christ; Jehovah's Witnesses use the same term, but mean "the Mighty creation by God."
4. Always include a clear presentation of the gospel. The death, burial, and resurrection of Christ on our behalf, according to the scriptures (1 Corinthians 15:1-4) is the power of God for salvation (Romans 1:16). It is irresponsible to destroy a cultist's beliefs without sharing how to be saved.
5. Don't assume you know what the cultist believes. Show personal interest by asking him to tell you what he believes. Then answer biblically.
6. Consult responsible Christian sources for information about what the cults teach and how to answer them from scripture. The wealth of good Christian material means you don't need to read cult publications or Christian publications that are not well-referenced and theologically sound.
We received a call from a woman who had attended one of our training sessions on witnessing to cultists. She was so excited we asked her to slow down. "I did it! I did it!" She laughed, "I mean, the Lord did it! And boy did He do it! I'm so excited! I've been studying and praying for a month for one of my employees who's a Jehovah's Witness. I never knew what to say to her, but I learned, and this morning we talked for three hours. I can't believe it! She saw the truth and prayed with me right then to accept Christ! This is fantastic!" We rejoiced with her, praising God for giving the increase and thanking Him for giving us hearts and minds to be used by the Holy Spirit to reach those lost in the cults.
For Further Help
When you are faced with a loved one in a cult, or you don't know how to share your faith with a cultist you know or who approaches you, you can find specific help from many different organizations dedicated to sharing the gospel with the cults. There are nearly 700 organizations worldwide engaged in research and evangelism of the cults, the occult, and world religions. Some are very small, volunteer organizations; some support large, professional staffs. Some charge for basic services, some don't. Some tackle many different belief systems and some are dedicated to evangelizing one particular cult or belief (e.g., Mormonism, reincarnation, etc.).
The Directory of Cult Research Organizations lists 652 of these cult research organizations and is an invaluable resource for pastors, church leaders, teachers, and Christians who are concerned with evangelizing cultists. It is available for $6.00 (plus $2.00 shipping) from Cornerstone, 920 W. Wilson, Chicago, IL 60640, telephone (312) 989-2080.
When you contact any organization, be sure to include a stamped, self-addressed business size envelope. If you request materials, be prepared to pay and thoughtfully include an adequate donation. Non-profit organizations often have very limited budgets.
In addition to the Directory, information is available from the cult research organization coalition, Evangelical Ministries to New Religions (EMNR). EMNR provides networking, conferences, and acts as a clearing house for cult research organizations. You may contact EMNR by writing Bob Passantino, Executive Director, EMNR, P.O. Box 2067, Costa Mesa, CA 92628.
Recommended Cult Research Organizations
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Answers In Action
P.O. Box 2067
Costa Mesa, California 92628
(949) 646-9042
Answers In Action c/o aia@answers.org
CULTS
Unlocking the Secret of the Secret
Rhonda Byrne's The Secret Isn't the Answer to Life
Copyright 2007 by Gretchen Passantino.
The Secret, a best-selling book, block-buster DVD, audio CD, web site, & related merchandising & seminar phenomenon, has blasted across cyberspace & the television airwaves in the last year, promising "the secret" to personal fulfillment, financial success, relationship abundance, & spiritual enlightenment. And it fits the old adage, "If it seems too good to be true, it probably is." In fact, once the fluff, Aussie accent, high production values, & esoteric vocabulary are removed there is literally nothing left. Even though it has been endorsed & extolled by many public luminaries, such as Oprah Winfrey, Larry King Live , & Ellen DeGeneres, The Secret is really nothing secret & nothing new: it is a splashy version of the prosperity, motivational, self-help mantra popularized by the 20th century sales guru W. Clement Stone (1902 - 2002), "conceive, believe, & achieve" - anything, anytime, anywhere, by anyone.
The Secret Defined
The Secret is defined by author & Australian television producer "Rhonda Byrne as "The Great Secret of Life is the law of attraction." She explains, "The law of attraction says like attracts like, so when you think a thought, you are also attracting like thoughts to you." She provides the analogy, "Thoughts are magnetic, and thoughts have a frequency. As you think thoughts, they are sent out into the Universe, and they magnetically attract all like things that are on the same frequency. Everything sent out returns to the source - you." Byrne concludes, "Your current thoughts are creating your future life. What you think about the most or focus on the most will appear as your life" (all quotes are from the book, page 25. All quotes in this article, unless otherwise noted, are from the book because it is the easiest to source, but the same teachings pervade all of the media forms of The Secret).
Some Promoters of The Secret
Among the motivational speakers who promote The Secret through Byrne's multi-media avalanche are Jack Canfield, author of the mega-industry Chicken Soup for the Soul series & Neale Donald Walsch, author of the best-selling Conversations with God.
The Secret Is Not Christian
Although The Secret is said to work for anyone, no matter what their religious beliefs or practices, the world view assumed by the promoters of The Secret is absolutely contradictory to the Christian world view.
The most important error of The Secret is that is promotes a self-centered faith rather than a God-centered faith. The Secret is all about how to achieve your own goals; how to increase your own wealth; how to attract all good things to yourself. The goal of life, according to The Secret, is self-indulgence, self-aggrandizement, & self-centeredness.
Contributor Joe Vitale says, "You are the masterpiece of your own life. You are the Michelangelo of your own life. The David you are sculpting is you" (23). Byrne makes this perfectly clear, proclaiming, "There is a truth deep down inside of you that has been waiting for you to discover it, and that Truth is this: you deserve all good things life has to offer" (41, italics original). She concludes, "All good things are your birthright! You are the creator of you, and the law of attraction is your magnificent tool to create whatever you want in your life. Welcome to the magic of life and the magnificence of You!" (41). Similar affirmations abound in the book, like "You are the heir to the kingdom. Prosperity is your birthright, and you hold the key to more abundance - in every area of your life - than you can possibly imagine. You deserve every good thing you want, but you have to summon it into your life" (109).
By contrast, the Bible reminds us that God in Jesus Christ is the creator, sustainer, & purpose for the universe. Paul reminds us that Christ has all of the preeminence (Col. 1:18). The writer to the Hebrews explains that the only glory we humans have for ourselves is because of our identity with Christ: "In bringing many sons to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom & through whom everything exists, should make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering" (Heb. 2:10). In Romans Paul explains that the glory God has prepared for us is not self-indulgent & materialistic, but instead, "God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified" (Romans 8:28-30).
The Beliefs Behind The Secret
The worldview presented by The Secret is not only self-centered rather than God-centered, but it also assumes many other beliefs contrary to Christianity, including pantheism, the impersonal nature of God, & that the self is in some way divine. The Secret promotes the inherent goodness of humanity and human salvation through self-actions. Important Christian doctrines are irrelevant to The Secret. It discards as irrelevant the doctrines of atonement, forgiveness, mercy, & grace. All suffering & evil is said to be natural products of self-determination (like the eastern view of karma). All ethics are relative ethics. There is no innocent suffering in The Secret. All those who suffer have caused their own suffering by their own "confession" of negativity in their lives.
The Secret's God Is Impersonal & Cartoonish
The Secret is very confused about the nature of God. At times it seems as though God is identified with the "law of attraction" or even "the universe." At one place, God is said to be like a Genie who can answer your "catalog orders." At still other times, God is You, yourself - the self you create with your manipulation of the law of attraction. None of these views of God can be reconciled with Christianity.
The Secret identifies God as impersonal in statements like this: "The law of attraction is a law of nature. It is impersonal and it does not see good things or bad things" (Bob Doyle, 13). "The law of attraction is a law of nature. It is as impartial and impersonal as the law of gravity is. It is precise and it is exact" (27). "Trust the Universe. Trust and believe and have faith" (57).
God is Your Personal Genie, According to The Secret
A step up from the impersonal God of nature, the universe, or the law of attraction (pantheism), is the novel comparison in The Secret to God as a Genie, a story-book character who grants your wishes on a whim.
The picture is explained in the book this way: "The Genie has simply answered your every command. The Genie is the law of attraction, and it is always present, and always listening to everything you think, speak, and act. . . . You are the Master of the Universe, and the Genie is there to serve you. The Genie never questions your commands. You think it, and the Genie immediately begins to leverage the Universe, through people, circumstances, and events, to fulfill your wish" (46).
This Genie is also compared to a dream catalog. Promoter Joe Vitali says, "This is really fun. It is like having the Universe as your catalogue. You flip through it and say, ‘I'd like to have this experience and I'd like to have that product, and I'd like to have a person like that.' It is You placing your order with the Universe. It's really that easy" (48).
You Are God, According to The Secret
At other places, The Secret makes it clear that you are your own God, your own creator, the only significant being in all of existence. We find, for example, "You are the creator of you, and the law of attraction is your magnificent tool to create whatever you want in your life" (41). "You are the creator of your life, and so begin by intentionally creating your day" (76).
The Secret makes no pretense that humans are created by God to worship, serve, love, and obey Him. On the contrary, promoter Lisa Nichols promises, "You are eternal life. You are God manifested in human form, made to perfection" (164). Byrne goes so far as to say, "You are God in a physical body. You are Spirit in the flesh. You are Eternal Life expressing Itself as You. You are a cosmic being. You are all power. You are all wisdom. You are all intelligence. You are perfection. You are magnificence. You are the creator, and you are creating the creation of You on this planet" (164).
The Secret concludes with this bold claim: "You will Be the power, you will be the perfection, you will Be the intelligence, you will Be the love, you will Be the joy" (182). "The earth turns on its orbit for You. The oceans ebb and flow for you. The birds sing for You. The sun rises and it sets for You. The stars come out for You. Every beautiful thing you see, every wondrous thing you experience, is all there, for You. Take a look around. None of it can exist, without You. No matter who you thought you were, now you know the Truth of Who You Really Are. You are the master of the Universe. You are the heir to the Kingdom. You are the perfection of Life. And now you know the Secret" (183).
The Secret Denies Sin & Moral Responsibility
According to the Secret, there is no such thing as right & wrong, good & evil - there are just the inexorable laws of the universe working themselves out in people who create their own reality through their own thoughts. By this reasoning, those who appear to be successful & happy are so because they have used the law of attraction to their own advantage. Those who appear to be suffering & sorrowful have become that way by their own self-destructive use of the law of attraction. Byrne points out, "The law of attraction doesn't care whether you perceive something to be good or bad, or whether you don't want it or want it. It's responding to your thoughts."
There is no room for pity according to The Secret, because, promoter Bob Doyle explains, "The only reason people do not have what they want is because they are thinking more about what they don't want than what they do want" (12). Byrne adds, "The law of attraction is a law of nature. It is impersonal and it does not see good things or bad things. It is receiving your thoughts and reflecting back to you those thoughts as your life experience. The law of attraction simply gives you whatever it is you are thinking about" (13).
If one adopts the philosophy of The Secret, one comes to the conclusion that anyone who is victimized must have wanted to be a victim. Byrne explains, "Often when people first hear this part of the Secret they recall events in history where masses of lives were lost, and they find it incomprehensible that so many people could have attracted themselves to the event. By the law of attraction, they had to be on the same frequency as the event. . . .those thoughts of fear, separation, and powerlessness, if persistent, can attract them to being in the wrong place at the wrong time" (28). There is no other explanation for evil & human suffering according to The Secret: "Nothing can come into your experience unless you summon it through persistent thoughts" (28).
It is no surprise, then, that The Secret's inexorable, impersonal, self-centered focus is remarkably like the ancient eastern law of karma, that the wheel of debt & credit turns eternally as souls progress cyclically through punishment & reward: "Just like the law of gravity, the law of attraction never slips up. . . . there are no exclusions to the law of attraction. If something came to you, you drew it, with prolonged thought. The law of attraction is precise" (36).
The Secret's God of Self-Indulgence
The core & circumference of the teachings of The Secret is egotism - yourself & your own desires trump everything else in existence. Even the practice of gratitude, highlighted in the materials, is not gratitude to our loving heavenly Father for his creativity, his preserving power, his forgiveness, mercy & grace. It is a mental exercise of cheerfulness that produces no works of charity for the good of others & no thankfulness to God for his blessings. Instead, as Byrne quotes early promoter Wallace Wattler, "The daily practice of gratitude is one of the conduits by which your wealth will come to you" (78). Byrne concurs, adding, "When you think you don't have enough to give, start giving. As you demonstrate faith in giving, the law of attraction will give you more to give" (108).
As an ultimate twist to the eternal plan of redemption centered in Christ, The Secret creates a counterfeit Jesus. The only comment in all of the materials about Jesus Christ is this daring fabrication: "Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and Jesus were not only prosperity teachers, but also millionaires themselves, with more affluent lifestyles than many present-day millionaires could conceive of" (109). No wonder Byrne concludes, "You are the heir to the kingdom. Prosperity is your birthright, and you hold the key to more abundance - in every area of your life - than you can possibly imagine. You deserve every good thing you want, but you have to summon it into your life" (109).
By contrast, the Jesus who actually existed & whose ministry & teachings are faithfully recorded in the Bible was self-sacrificing, humble, and compassionate. He revealed that we, who are created in God's image & for His glory, can only be fulfilled by receiving Christ as Savior, experiencing regeneration by the power of the Holy Spirit, & yielding ourselves to God's kingdom power in our lives.
God did not create the world as our personal Genie or mail order catalog & he did not send His Son Jesus to make us wealthy, but because He loved us: "God so loved the world that he gave his one & only Son, the whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life" (John 3:16). Jesus did not bring a plan to turn us all into millionaires, but to reconcile us to God: "I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance" (Luke 5:32). Jesus has not promised us material riches, but spiritual renewal & everlasting life: "Come to me, all you who are weary & burdened, & I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you & learn from me, for I am gentle & humble in heart, & you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy & my burden is light" (Matthew 11:28-30).
The purpose of our lives, the only way we can be truly fulfilled, is not by "materializing" our selfish desires, but instead our purpose is to surrender everything we are, & everything we have, to God: "The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit & they are life" (John 6:63). When we surrender to the Lord, we will find the true meaning of our existence. It is no secret. When we possess the true purpose of life, we can join the apostle Paul in declaring, "I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, & I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any & every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength" (Philippians 4:11-13). When we are secure in our love of God & His plan, then we can "not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer & petition, with thanksgiving, present our requests to God" (Philippians 4:6). Finally, when we reject the self-indulgence of The Secret for devotion to God, our focus will be completely different. After the same manner as Paul, we will meditate on "whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable," & in doing so, we will experience, "the peace of God, which transcends all understanding" & which will "guard our hearts & minds in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 4:7-9).
The above was originally posted as an AIA news article ,Rhonda Byrne's The Secret Isn't the Answer to Life.
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Answers In Action
P.O. Box 2067
Costa Mesa, California 92628
(949) 646-9042
Answers In Action c/o aia@answers.org
Rhonda Byrne's The Secret Isn't the Answer to Life
Copyright 2007 by Gretchen Passantino.
The Secret, a best-selling book, block-buster DVD, audio CD, web site, & related merchandising & seminar phenomenon, has blasted across cyberspace & the television airwaves in the last year, promising "the secret" to personal fulfillment, financial success, relationship abundance, & spiritual enlightenment. And it fits the old adage, "If it seems too good to be true, it probably is." In fact, once the fluff, Aussie accent, high production values, & esoteric vocabulary are removed there is literally nothing left. Even though it has been endorsed & extolled by many public luminaries, such as Oprah Winfrey, Larry King Live , & Ellen DeGeneres, The Secret is really nothing secret & nothing new: it is a splashy version of the prosperity, motivational, self-help mantra popularized by the 20th century sales guru W. Clement Stone (1902 - 2002), "conceive, believe, & achieve" - anything, anytime, anywhere, by anyone.
The Secret Defined
The Secret is defined by author & Australian television producer "Rhonda Byrne as "The Great Secret of Life is the law of attraction." She explains, "The law of attraction says like attracts like, so when you think a thought, you are also attracting like thoughts to you." She provides the analogy, "Thoughts are magnetic, and thoughts have a frequency. As you think thoughts, they are sent out into the Universe, and they magnetically attract all like things that are on the same frequency. Everything sent out returns to the source - you." Byrne concludes, "Your current thoughts are creating your future life. What you think about the most or focus on the most will appear as your life" (all quotes are from the book, page 25. All quotes in this article, unless otherwise noted, are from the book because it is the easiest to source, but the same teachings pervade all of the media forms of The Secret).
Some Promoters of The Secret
Among the motivational speakers who promote The Secret through Byrne's multi-media avalanche are Jack Canfield, author of the mega-industry Chicken Soup for the Soul series & Neale Donald Walsch, author of the best-selling Conversations with God.
The Secret Is Not Christian
Although The Secret is said to work for anyone, no matter what their religious beliefs or practices, the world view assumed by the promoters of The Secret is absolutely contradictory to the Christian world view.
The most important error of The Secret is that is promotes a self-centered faith rather than a God-centered faith. The Secret is all about how to achieve your own goals; how to increase your own wealth; how to attract all good things to yourself. The goal of life, according to The Secret, is self-indulgence, self-aggrandizement, & self-centeredness.
Contributor Joe Vitale says, "You are the masterpiece of your own life. You are the Michelangelo of your own life. The David you are sculpting is you" (23). Byrne makes this perfectly clear, proclaiming, "There is a truth deep down inside of you that has been waiting for you to discover it, and that Truth is this: you deserve all good things life has to offer" (41, italics original). She concludes, "All good things are your birthright! You are the creator of you, and the law of attraction is your magnificent tool to create whatever you want in your life. Welcome to the magic of life and the magnificence of You!" (41). Similar affirmations abound in the book, like "You are the heir to the kingdom. Prosperity is your birthright, and you hold the key to more abundance - in every area of your life - than you can possibly imagine. You deserve every good thing you want, but you have to summon it into your life" (109).
By contrast, the Bible reminds us that God in Jesus Christ is the creator, sustainer, & purpose for the universe. Paul reminds us that Christ has all of the preeminence (Col. 1:18). The writer to the Hebrews explains that the only glory we humans have for ourselves is because of our identity with Christ: "In bringing many sons to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom & through whom everything exists, should make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering" (Heb. 2:10). In Romans Paul explains that the glory God has prepared for us is not self-indulgent & materialistic, but instead, "God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified" (Romans 8:28-30).
The Beliefs Behind The Secret
The worldview presented by The Secret is not only self-centered rather than God-centered, but it also assumes many other beliefs contrary to Christianity, including pantheism, the impersonal nature of God, & that the self is in some way divine. The Secret promotes the inherent goodness of humanity and human salvation through self-actions. Important Christian doctrines are irrelevant to The Secret. It discards as irrelevant the doctrines of atonement, forgiveness, mercy, & grace. All suffering & evil is said to be natural products of self-determination (like the eastern view of karma). All ethics are relative ethics. There is no innocent suffering in The Secret. All those who suffer have caused their own suffering by their own "confession" of negativity in their lives.
The Secret's God Is Impersonal & Cartoonish
The Secret is very confused about the nature of God. At times it seems as though God is identified with the "law of attraction" or even "the universe." At one place, God is said to be like a Genie who can answer your "catalog orders." At still other times, God is You, yourself - the self you create with your manipulation of the law of attraction. None of these views of God can be reconciled with Christianity.
The Secret identifies God as impersonal in statements like this: "The law of attraction is a law of nature. It is impersonal and it does not see good things or bad things" (Bob Doyle, 13). "The law of attraction is a law of nature. It is as impartial and impersonal as the law of gravity is. It is precise and it is exact" (27). "Trust the Universe. Trust and believe and have faith" (57).
God is Your Personal Genie, According to The Secret
A step up from the impersonal God of nature, the universe, or the law of attraction (pantheism), is the novel comparison in The Secret to God as a Genie, a story-book character who grants your wishes on a whim.
The picture is explained in the book this way: "The Genie has simply answered your every command. The Genie is the law of attraction, and it is always present, and always listening to everything you think, speak, and act. . . . You are the Master of the Universe, and the Genie is there to serve you. The Genie never questions your commands. You think it, and the Genie immediately begins to leverage the Universe, through people, circumstances, and events, to fulfill your wish" (46).
This Genie is also compared to a dream catalog. Promoter Joe Vitali says, "This is really fun. It is like having the Universe as your catalogue. You flip through it and say, ‘I'd like to have this experience and I'd like to have that product, and I'd like to have a person like that.' It is You placing your order with the Universe. It's really that easy" (48).
You Are God, According to The Secret
At other places, The Secret makes it clear that you are your own God, your own creator, the only significant being in all of existence. We find, for example, "You are the creator of you, and the law of attraction is your magnificent tool to create whatever you want in your life" (41). "You are the creator of your life, and so begin by intentionally creating your day" (76).
The Secret makes no pretense that humans are created by God to worship, serve, love, and obey Him. On the contrary, promoter Lisa Nichols promises, "You are eternal life. You are God manifested in human form, made to perfection" (164). Byrne goes so far as to say, "You are God in a physical body. You are Spirit in the flesh. You are Eternal Life expressing Itself as You. You are a cosmic being. You are all power. You are all wisdom. You are all intelligence. You are perfection. You are magnificence. You are the creator, and you are creating the creation of You on this planet" (164).
The Secret concludes with this bold claim: "You will Be the power, you will be the perfection, you will Be the intelligence, you will Be the love, you will Be the joy" (182). "The earth turns on its orbit for You. The oceans ebb and flow for you. The birds sing for You. The sun rises and it sets for You. The stars come out for You. Every beautiful thing you see, every wondrous thing you experience, is all there, for You. Take a look around. None of it can exist, without You. No matter who you thought you were, now you know the Truth of Who You Really Are. You are the master of the Universe. You are the heir to the Kingdom. You are the perfection of Life. And now you know the Secret" (183).
The Secret Denies Sin & Moral Responsibility
According to the Secret, there is no such thing as right & wrong, good & evil - there are just the inexorable laws of the universe working themselves out in people who create their own reality through their own thoughts. By this reasoning, those who appear to be successful & happy are so because they have used the law of attraction to their own advantage. Those who appear to be suffering & sorrowful have become that way by their own self-destructive use of the law of attraction. Byrne points out, "The law of attraction doesn't care whether you perceive something to be good or bad, or whether you don't want it or want it. It's responding to your thoughts."
There is no room for pity according to The Secret, because, promoter Bob Doyle explains, "The only reason people do not have what they want is because they are thinking more about what they don't want than what they do want" (12). Byrne adds, "The law of attraction is a law of nature. It is impersonal and it does not see good things or bad things. It is receiving your thoughts and reflecting back to you those thoughts as your life experience. The law of attraction simply gives you whatever it is you are thinking about" (13).
If one adopts the philosophy of The Secret, one comes to the conclusion that anyone who is victimized must have wanted to be a victim. Byrne explains, "Often when people first hear this part of the Secret they recall events in history where masses of lives were lost, and they find it incomprehensible that so many people could have attracted themselves to the event. By the law of attraction, they had to be on the same frequency as the event. . . .those thoughts of fear, separation, and powerlessness, if persistent, can attract them to being in the wrong place at the wrong time" (28). There is no other explanation for evil & human suffering according to The Secret: "Nothing can come into your experience unless you summon it through persistent thoughts" (28).
It is no surprise, then, that The Secret's inexorable, impersonal, self-centered focus is remarkably like the ancient eastern law of karma, that the wheel of debt & credit turns eternally as souls progress cyclically through punishment & reward: "Just like the law of gravity, the law of attraction never slips up. . . . there are no exclusions to the law of attraction. If something came to you, you drew it, with prolonged thought. The law of attraction is precise" (36).
The Secret's God of Self-Indulgence
The core & circumference of the teachings of The Secret is egotism - yourself & your own desires trump everything else in existence. Even the practice of gratitude, highlighted in the materials, is not gratitude to our loving heavenly Father for his creativity, his preserving power, his forgiveness, mercy & grace. It is a mental exercise of cheerfulness that produces no works of charity for the good of others & no thankfulness to God for his blessings. Instead, as Byrne quotes early promoter Wallace Wattler, "The daily practice of gratitude is one of the conduits by which your wealth will come to you" (78). Byrne concurs, adding, "When you think you don't have enough to give, start giving. As you demonstrate faith in giving, the law of attraction will give you more to give" (108).
As an ultimate twist to the eternal plan of redemption centered in Christ, The Secret creates a counterfeit Jesus. The only comment in all of the materials about Jesus Christ is this daring fabrication: "Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and Jesus were not only prosperity teachers, but also millionaires themselves, with more affluent lifestyles than many present-day millionaires could conceive of" (109). No wonder Byrne concludes, "You are the heir to the kingdom. Prosperity is your birthright, and you hold the key to more abundance - in every area of your life - than you can possibly imagine. You deserve every good thing you want, but you have to summon it into your life" (109).
By contrast, the Jesus who actually existed & whose ministry & teachings are faithfully recorded in the Bible was self-sacrificing, humble, and compassionate. He revealed that we, who are created in God's image & for His glory, can only be fulfilled by receiving Christ as Savior, experiencing regeneration by the power of the Holy Spirit, & yielding ourselves to God's kingdom power in our lives.
God did not create the world as our personal Genie or mail order catalog & he did not send His Son Jesus to make us wealthy, but because He loved us: "God so loved the world that he gave his one & only Son, the whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life" (John 3:16). Jesus did not bring a plan to turn us all into millionaires, but to reconcile us to God: "I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance" (Luke 5:32). Jesus has not promised us material riches, but spiritual renewal & everlasting life: "Come to me, all you who are weary & burdened, & I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you & learn from me, for I am gentle & humble in heart, & you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy & my burden is light" (Matthew 11:28-30).
The purpose of our lives, the only way we can be truly fulfilled, is not by "materializing" our selfish desires, but instead our purpose is to surrender everything we are, & everything we have, to God: "The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit & they are life" (John 6:63). When we surrender to the Lord, we will find the true meaning of our existence. It is no secret. When we possess the true purpose of life, we can join the apostle Paul in declaring, "I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, & I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any & every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength" (Philippians 4:11-13). When we are secure in our love of God & His plan, then we can "not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer & petition, with thanksgiving, present our requests to God" (Philippians 4:6). Finally, when we reject the self-indulgence of The Secret for devotion to God, our focus will be completely different. After the same manner as Paul, we will meditate on "whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable," & in doing so, we will experience, "the peace of God, which transcends all understanding" & which will "guard our hearts & minds in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 4:7-9).
The above was originally posted as an AIA news article ,Rhonda Byrne's The Secret Isn't the Answer to Life.
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P.O. Box 2067
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CULTS
The Heaven's Gate Cult
Copyright 1997 by Gretchen Passantino.
The Heaven's Gate cult is one of literally thousands of millennial cults, including hundreds of UFO-based cults around the world. They attract followers by promising escape from expected cataclysmic events that supposedly will signal the end of this millennium. The Heaven's Gate cult is the last stage in the almost three-decade transformation of a vagabond couple's UFO delusions into a sophisticated Internet suicide cult.
The Heaven's Gate cult was led by a man named Marshall Applewhite, who claimed that his spiritual name was "Do." He began his "Star Trek" in the early 1970s with a female partner, Bonnie Nettles, who used the spiritual name "Ti" (pronounced "Tee"). (She died of cancer in 1985.)
At that time, the two, who met in a hospital (Bonnie was a nurse, Marshall a mental patient), came to believe that they were humans inhabited by the souls of extra-terrestrials from "the Kingdom of Heaven." They believed they were to be "the two witnesses" of the biblical book of Revelation (Rev. 11:3ff). They came to be called, first, "The Two Witnesses of Revelation," and then simply, "The Two." They traveled around the country doing odd jobs and leaving "calling cards" at local churches announcing their mission. As they gathered "students" around them, they realized that they were like "Bo - Peep," looking for her lost sheep. They called themselves "Bo" and "Peep" for some time. They taught their followers that they could only enter the Kingdom of Heaven (leave earth on the space ship for a higher plane of existence) by renouncing all human possessions -- including family, fortune, and material assets. Bo and Peep took care of disposing of the assets of their followers for them.
Bo and Peep (Do and Ti) believed that they would fulfill Rev. 11 by being killed, lying dead in the street for three days, and then being "raised" from the dead into the space ship, along with their followers. As the day for their "sacrifice" approached, they preached that their death and "resurrection" would prove the truthfulness of their preaching.
It was during this time (late 1974 - 1975) that we encountered them as we investigated more than fourteen UFO-based cult groups in the greater Los Angeles area. As we questioned them and their followers about their backgrounds and their evidence for their beliefs, they all pointed to the coming "demonstration" as the final proof. One evening, outside one of their public information meetings in late fall of 1975, we encountered both "the Two" and a rival UFO group, the Academy of Atlantis, which we had also researched, debating each other over the relative merits of their inter-galactic theologies. We reminded the Academy of Atlantis representatives that several months earlier they had promised us that we would know they had the true UFO gospel because one of their UFO entities would hold a public press conference with the President of the United States on the lawn of the White House -- during the summer that had just ended. "What had happened," we asked, "to your adamant assertion that you would produce the proof? Are you false prophets?" They assured us that they were still true prophets, that the world "just wasn't ready" for the full disclosure yet. To this, the Bo - Peep followers derisively mocked, "We wouldn't pull that! You're false prophets! We have the truth! Do and Ti will be a demonstration no one can deny!" However, it didn't surprise us when shortly after, Bo and Peep got a new revelation -- they had been "massacred" in the press, so they didn't need to be killed physically after all!
The Two and their followers disappeared by early 1976, and over time most of the followers returned to normal life. The group resurfaced at various times with various names during the subsequent decades. They paid for full-page ads in many newspapers nationwide during 1988, and again in 1993. (Ominously, their ad in USA Today and other newspapers warned that anyone who truly desired to enter the Kingdom of Heaven would have to give up everything -- including their human existence. In 1995, the group entered its final phase:
The final act of metamorphosis or separation from the human kingdom is the "disconnect" or separation from the human physical container or body in order to be released from the human environment for the Next Level. . . . We will rendezvous in the "clouds" (a giant mothership) for our briefing and journey to the Kingdom of the Literal Heavens.
Tragically, Do evidently received no last-minute "new" revelation allowing the group to escape the final removal. Their last web site message reads, "Hale-Bopp Brings Closure . . . . Our 22 years of classroom here on planet Earth is finally coming to conclusion -- "graduation" from the Human Evolutionary Level. We are happily prepared to leave "this world" and go with Te's crew."
It would make us all feel more safe and comfortable if only fools or insane people succombed to such destructive theology. Sadly, the cults recruit members from all walks of life, all levels of intellectual prowess. People who want to believe that there is more to life than mere existence, that there are eternal values, and that Someone greater than they cares for them are seduced into cults like the Heaven's Gate cult because they are ill-equipped to make responsible, evidentially supported, rational religious commitments. A well-reasoned, cautious, and fact-based approach to questionable "gospels" is the best antidote to falsehood, and the enlightening power of the Holy Spirit will show the true Gate to the Kingdom of Heaven, Jesus Christ (Matt. 17:13; John 10:7-10).
Very few people have depth of commitment to be willing to die for the truthfulness of their spiritual claims. However, once that commitment is made, it doesn't take enormous power to execute. Only One had the power to prove the truth of his claims by rising from the dead. Don't follow any religious leader to death until he's proved his credentials, not only by dying, but by rising again victorious over death.
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Answers In Action
P.O. Box 2067
Costa Mesa, California 92628
(949) 646-9042
Answers In Action c/o aia@answers.org
Copyright 1997 by Gretchen Passantino.
The Heaven's Gate cult is one of literally thousands of millennial cults, including hundreds of UFO-based cults around the world. They attract followers by promising escape from expected cataclysmic events that supposedly will signal the end of this millennium. The Heaven's Gate cult is the last stage in the almost three-decade transformation of a vagabond couple's UFO delusions into a sophisticated Internet suicide cult.
The Heaven's Gate cult was led by a man named Marshall Applewhite, who claimed that his spiritual name was "Do." He began his "Star Trek" in the early 1970s with a female partner, Bonnie Nettles, who used the spiritual name "Ti" (pronounced "Tee"). (She died of cancer in 1985.)
At that time, the two, who met in a hospital (Bonnie was a nurse, Marshall a mental patient), came to believe that they were humans inhabited by the souls of extra-terrestrials from "the Kingdom of Heaven." They believed they were to be "the two witnesses" of the biblical book of Revelation (Rev. 11:3ff). They came to be called, first, "The Two Witnesses of Revelation," and then simply, "The Two." They traveled around the country doing odd jobs and leaving "calling cards" at local churches announcing their mission. As they gathered "students" around them, they realized that they were like "Bo - Peep," looking for her lost sheep. They called themselves "Bo" and "Peep" for some time. They taught their followers that they could only enter the Kingdom of Heaven (leave earth on the space ship for a higher plane of existence) by renouncing all human possessions -- including family, fortune, and material assets. Bo and Peep took care of disposing of the assets of their followers for them.
Bo and Peep (Do and Ti) believed that they would fulfill Rev. 11 by being killed, lying dead in the street for three days, and then being "raised" from the dead into the space ship, along with their followers. As the day for their "sacrifice" approached, they preached that their death and "resurrection" would prove the truthfulness of their preaching.
It was during this time (late 1974 - 1975) that we encountered them as we investigated more than fourteen UFO-based cult groups in the greater Los Angeles area. As we questioned them and their followers about their backgrounds and their evidence for their beliefs, they all pointed to the coming "demonstration" as the final proof. One evening, outside one of their public information meetings in late fall of 1975, we encountered both "the Two" and a rival UFO group, the Academy of Atlantis, which we had also researched, debating each other over the relative merits of their inter-galactic theologies. We reminded the Academy of Atlantis representatives that several months earlier they had promised us that we would know they had the true UFO gospel because one of their UFO entities would hold a public press conference with the President of the United States on the lawn of the White House -- during the summer that had just ended. "What had happened," we asked, "to your adamant assertion that you would produce the proof? Are you false prophets?" They assured us that they were still true prophets, that the world "just wasn't ready" for the full disclosure yet. To this, the Bo - Peep followers derisively mocked, "We wouldn't pull that! You're false prophets! We have the truth! Do and Ti will be a demonstration no one can deny!" However, it didn't surprise us when shortly after, Bo and Peep got a new revelation -- they had been "massacred" in the press, so they didn't need to be killed physically after all!
The Two and their followers disappeared by early 1976, and over time most of the followers returned to normal life. The group resurfaced at various times with various names during the subsequent decades. They paid for full-page ads in many newspapers nationwide during 1988, and again in 1993. (Ominously, their ad in USA Today and other newspapers warned that anyone who truly desired to enter the Kingdom of Heaven would have to give up everything -- including their human existence. In 1995, the group entered its final phase:
The final act of metamorphosis or separation from the human kingdom is the "disconnect" or separation from the human physical container or body in order to be released from the human environment for the Next Level. . . . We will rendezvous in the "clouds" (a giant mothership) for our briefing and journey to the Kingdom of the Literal Heavens.
Tragically, Do evidently received no last-minute "new" revelation allowing the group to escape the final removal. Their last web site message reads, "Hale-Bopp Brings Closure . . . . Our 22 years of classroom here on planet Earth is finally coming to conclusion -- "graduation" from the Human Evolutionary Level. We are happily prepared to leave "this world" and go with Te's crew."
It would make us all feel more safe and comfortable if only fools or insane people succombed to such destructive theology. Sadly, the cults recruit members from all walks of life, all levels of intellectual prowess. People who want to believe that there is more to life than mere existence, that there are eternal values, and that Someone greater than they cares for them are seduced into cults like the Heaven's Gate cult because they are ill-equipped to make responsible, evidentially supported, rational religious commitments. A well-reasoned, cautious, and fact-based approach to questionable "gospels" is the best antidote to falsehood, and the enlightening power of the Holy Spirit will show the true Gate to the Kingdom of Heaven, Jesus Christ (Matt. 17:13; John 10:7-10).
Very few people have depth of commitment to be willing to die for the truthfulness of their spiritual claims. However, once that commitment is made, it doesn't take enormous power to execute. Only One had the power to prove the truth of his claims by rising from the dead. Don't follow any religious leader to death until he's proved his credentials, not only by dying, but by rising again victorious over death.
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Answers In Action
P.O. Box 2067
Costa Mesa, California 92628
(949) 646-9042
Answers In Action c/o aia@answers.org
CULTS
The Feds Meet Self-styled "God's Anointed Avenger"
© 1992 by Gretchen Passantino.
This article first appeared in World Magazine
God's anointed met the enemy at Mount Carmel. From his sanctuary he watched more than 400 of his enemies prepare for the assault. He alone stood for the Lord, the Almighty, the only true God. He was confident that his enemies would fail. And when they did, he would fulfill God's avenging Will and slaughter them all. Self-styled prophet Vernon Howell (aka David Koresh) last week re-enacted Elijah's ancient stand against the prophets of Baal. Howell's standoff occurred at his cult's headquarters, "Mount Carmel," near Waco, Texas. Elijah's standoff had occurred on Mount Carmel in ancient Israel. When the Lord answered Elijah's prayers and not those of the prophets of Baal, Elijah slaughtered them all. As of this writing, Howell is still waiting for the Lord to answer him. FBI and ATF agents, having lost four ATF agents in their initial assault February 28, are prepared to stop any further slaughter.
Howell is no Elijah. His carefully constructed persona fails to mask his religious delusions. He adopted the name David Koresh to symbolize his belief that he is God's Anointed for today. David was God's anointed as the king of Israel; Koresh is a designation of the Persian king Cyrus, who was ordained by God (Isaiah 45:1) to authorize and finance the rebuilding of the Jewish temple after the Babylonian captivity (2 Chronicles 36). When outsiders, including the media and law enforcement call him "David Koresh" he says that proves even his enemies know he is God's Anointed. He claims to be Jesus Christ, the "Lamb" of Revelation 5, and God's avenger against the world.
A shy, reclusive ninth-grade dropout from Texas had evolved into a despotic cult leader, able to command hundreds of followers and hold off 400 federal agents for days outside his dusty Mount Carmel compound.
The Cult
Vernon Howell's cult traces its origin to 1929, when Bulgarian immigrant Victor Houteff, dissatisfied with his own Seventh Day Adventist church in Los Angeles, broke away and moved to Texas to start his own church, which he called "the Shepherd's Rod." The Seventh Day Adventists have a tradition, started by founder Ellen G. White, of accepting modern-day prophecy and of expecting the imminent return of Jesus Christ in judgment. Ironically, one of Houteff's contentions with the Seventh Day Adventist church was that it was not pacifistic enough -- he disagreed with its practice of approving member participation in the armed forces in noncombat positions.
At the beginning of World War II Houteff changed the group's name to Davidic Seventh-day Adventists. When he died in 1957, his wife, Florence, assumed control and prophesied that the Second Coming of Christ would occur by April 22, 1959. Florence resigned from leadership of her 1,400 member group when the prophesy failed.
The Davidic Seventh-day Adventists split during 1959, the core of the group remaining near Waco, Texas and eventually assuming the name "Branch Davidians" under the leadership of the Roden family. In 1981 Vernon Howell joined the group as handyman assistant to then-leader Lois Roden. In 1983, when Lois' son, George, assumed control of the group, Howell unsuccessfully fought him for control. Howell returned to the headquarters in 1987, led a gun battle against George, was acquitted of attempted murder charges, and assumed control of the group in 1988. From 1986 - 1991 he recruited new members in Canada, Hawaii, California, England, and Australia; and then concentrated on rebuilding and fortifying the headquarters compound, "Mount Carmel," during 1992.
Distinctive teachings of the Branch Davidians include that Howell is Jesus Christ, that they will be God's instruments to implement God's final judgment, that Howell, destined to be a martyr, is entitled to 140 wives, and that the Sabbath must be observed from sundown Friday through sundown Sunday.
The Man
Vernon Howell was born in 1960 and spent his childhood in Tyler, Texas. He was described as shy and reclusive, and diagnosed with "learning disabilities." He dropped out of school in the ninth grade, but claims to have memorized the New Testament by the time he was twelve.
At nineteen Howell was baptized into the Seventh Day Adventist church, but was asked to leave scarcely two years later because of behavior and scripture interpretation problems. That same year, 1981, he joined the Rodens' Branch Davidian sect.
Over the next seven years he grew into his later grandiose persona. He built his base of power, took over the sect, accumulated one legal wife (Rachel, then 14) and dozens of other women, and began preaching his version of the end of the world and the Last Judgment. He also pursued his lifelong love of hard rock music, associating with rock musicians, playing with different bands, and recruiting players for "God's" band.
Howell's dire predictions of coming warfare and his own martyrdom date to 1983 or 1984, when, according to one ex-member, "he was always teaching that he was going to be killed and going to be a martyr." Another ex-member recalled Howell's preoccupation with violence, recounting, "The night I met Koresh . . . he asked me, 'Would you die for Christ?' I said I guess so. He said, 'Would you kill for him?' I said no. He turned to my friend and said, 'Hey, you just brought me another weak Christian.'" The defense attorney for Howell and his followers in the trial over the 1987 gunfight with Roden remembered, "Vernon had told them that some day somebody was going to be coming for them, and that they better be ready."
Perhaps the most eerie connection between Howell and violence is his own interpretations of select Bible passages. He identifies himself with Elijah, who used God's power to defeat the false prophets of Baal at biblical Israel's Mount Carmel. He identifies with David, the king who subdued the enemies of God through warfare. He takes his last name, Koresh, a designation of the Persian king Cyrus, because he believes he, like Cyrus, is anointed by God to re-establish the true faith by destroying the ungodly. Most importantly, he identifies himself with the Second Coming of Jesus Christ, especially as Christ is described in Revelation 5, 10, and 18 -- the avenging Son of God who will destroy all the unrighteous with his heavenly army. One of his favorite self-descriptions is from Isaiah 11:4 -- "He shall strike the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of His lips He shall slay the wicked." Taking the language of Isaiah 63 and Revelation 18, he believes the "Day of Vengeance" has come, and he is the executioner.
The Shootout
The stage was set. Howell, now 33, the same age as Jesus at His death, worked by his own prophetic agenda. He was ready for war. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (BATF) agents, working a nine month investigation which involved informants, surveillance, and undercover infiltration, were convinced that Howell was stockpiling illegal weapons and explosives, and in addition was propagating illegal activities including child abuse and unlawful intercourse with minors (He is said to take new "wives" when they are between 11 and 14 years old). The plights of the women and especially the children gave the investigation more impetus, and the BATF made its move to serve search and arrest warrants around 9:30 a.m. Sunday, February 28.
Within forty-five minutes, four ATF agents were dead, 15 wounded, and three cult members were later confirmed dead. Howell himself claimed to have been shot in the abdomen. ATF spokespersons tried to explain the debacle, surmising that someone had tipped Howell off minutes before the raid, noting that they were unaware of the .50 caliber armor-piercing machine gun in the control tower, and also pointing out that, with so many women and children in the compound, they were unable to return fire through walls at unseen targets, while Howell's followers shot indiscriminately through walls at the agents.
After the initial assault, a cease fire allowed ATF agents to remove their dead and wounded, and the long standoff began. Nearby residents noted that Howell's followers had stockpiled supplies. FBI spokesmen noted that the compound was largely self-sufficient with its own wells and supplies, and the members used to doing without electricity or indoor plumbing.
Throughout the next five days, Howell and federal officials negotiated the intermittent release of 20 children and 2 adults. By Friday, March 5, 106 individuals were left inside the compound, including Howell. At first Howell had telephone access to the media and granted interviews to the Associated Press and CNN as well as other journalists. However, the FBI later cut his direct communication with anyone but them. Howell resorted to making promises in exchange for having his taped messages, delivered by children as they left, aired on radio. Tuesday, March 2, he promised everyone would surrender peacefully if his 58 minute audio cassette message was aired "nationally." Several Texas radio stations aired the message, a rambling, disjointed survey of dozens of disconnected Bible verses, but Howell rescinded his promise to give up. He declared that God had told him not to leave, and he would take further action only when God told him what to do. Given his teachings concerning violence and martyrdom, many ex-members and cult experts are concerned that the standoff cannot end without further bloodshed.
One hundred seemingly normal, rational people followed him to almost certain death. But as one person agreed, it's easy to suspend disbelief, to become caught up in a charismatic leader's vision, as one person put it, "When you first see him. . . you think, 'Who's this guy kidding?' But when he's talking, it's like something comes over you and you get swept up with it. A little bit of charm and you get to the point where you believe this, you believe that, and you come so far, it's just that you believe all of it." And the world sits, mesmerized by live television coverage and screaming newspaper headlines, swept up ourselves, unwittingly, into one madman's vision of the end.
Gretchen Passantino
Lessons from Waco
By Gretchen Passantino
Copyright 1992 by Bob and Gretchen Passantino. Reproduction or publication of the content in any manner, without express permission of the author is prohibited.
This article first appeared in World Magazine
With excruciating deliberation, the FBI executed successive steps toward peacefully ending their armed standoff with Branch Davidian cult members near Waco, Texas. They called on years of hostage negotiation experience, panels of forensic psychology experts, teams of crisis intervention specialists, numerous religious, biblical, theological, and cult advisors, and the best anti-terrorist authorities. Step-by-step they narrowed the compound perimeters, restricted outside contacts, disrupted sleep and daily habits, and pressed the hoped-for peaceful resolution.
But on Monday, April 19, David Koresh and 86 Branch Davidians, including up to 24 children, died in a firestorm of gunfire, propane, lantern oil, and exploding munitions. Nine adults survived the end to the tense 51 day siege begun February 28 when Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms agents were attacked attempting to serve arrest and search warrants at the compound for illegal arms and ammunition. In that initial skirmish four ATF agents were killed, 15 wounded, and perhaps as many as 10 cult members were killed.
As congressional hearings continue and federal officials investigate, the religious aspects of the Waco disaster will be an important part of their deliberations. Were Koresh's religious convictions weighed heavily enough? Were his followers' fanatical loyalty and resultant actions properly guaged? Was there any way religious insight could have saved lives?
Most agree Koresh's religious convictions were accurately considered. Koresh was convinced that he was the Lamb of God, that God had appointed him the executor of God's judgment, and that he and his followers were destined for firey, deadly battle. Koresh's last two letters, included challenges such as "I AM your God and you will bow under my feet . . . I AM your life and your death. . . . Fear Me, for I have you in My snare."
Religious researcher Phillip Arnold attempted to convince Koresh of an alternate, non-violent understanding of apocalyptic scriptures Koresh applied to the siege. Koresh's attorney, Dick DeGuerin, tried to negotiate a peaceful surrender. And yet neither produced any wavering by Koresh from his personal Armaggeddon. As FBI lawyer Danny Coulson remarked, "Inside [the compound] he's God. Outside, he's an inmate on trial for his life. What was he going to do?"
Even given the inevitability of Koresh's self-destruction, there is some indication that the FBI could have anticipated more accurately the final results through more accurate religious analysis. The FBI was confident the Davidian mothers instinctively would send their children out of the way of the tear gas and demolition, and yet their calculations did expect the mothers' absolute conviction that sending their children out would be to destine them to death at the hands of the enemy. A Justice department official, speaking with the clarity of hindsight, remarked, "This wasn't a normal hostage situation. . . . Not only were they there, they were willing to do anything for this person."
The Branch Davidians believed Koresh's prophecies concerning the inevitability of their martyrdom by fire. Koresh's favorite apocalyptic scriptures speak of destruction (Revelation 11:5), judgment (Revelation 8:5), and cleansing by fire (1 Corinthians 3:13-15). Koresh often compared himself to the prophet Elijah, who challenged the prophets of the fase gods in ancient Israel. He told the story of how Elijah dared the enemies to display divine power through their sacrifices. They failed, and the true God Yahweh sent fire from heaven to consume Elijah's sacrifice on Mount Carmel. The false prophets fled, only to be slaughtered by Elijah. Koresh was their Elijah, they were the sacrifice, and the federal forces were the false prophets destined for destruction. Whether or not the Davidians set the initial fires, they found themselves cast in the divine drama prefigured by Elijah and consumated by David Koresh. In the end, whether they welcomed the flames or were forced by Koresh's indominatable will, there was no escape.
Could the FBI have devised some alternative designed to frustrate fulfillment of Koresh's fire images? Perhaps. Attorney General Janet Reno said, "based on what we know now, obviously [what we did] was wrong." But the playwright of the drama wrote only one ending: death and destruction.
We will learn from this tragedy. Law enforcement, psychologists, politicians, talk show hosts, and bureaucrats will suggest legislation, policies, and plans to prevent another Mount Carmel, just as they did after 1978's mass deaths of 913 Peoples' Temple members in Jonestown, Guyana. But laws and strategies don't use the most powerful weapons we have as members of a free society: individual commitment to rationality and personal religious responsibility.
Gretchen Passantino
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Answers In Action
P.O. Box 2067
Costa Mesa, California 92628
(949) 646-9042
Answers In Action c/o aia@answers.org
© 1992 by Gretchen Passantino.
This article first appeared in World Magazine
God's anointed met the enemy at Mount Carmel. From his sanctuary he watched more than 400 of his enemies prepare for the assault. He alone stood for the Lord, the Almighty, the only true God. He was confident that his enemies would fail. And when they did, he would fulfill God's avenging Will and slaughter them all. Self-styled prophet Vernon Howell (aka David Koresh) last week re-enacted Elijah's ancient stand against the prophets of Baal. Howell's standoff occurred at his cult's headquarters, "Mount Carmel," near Waco, Texas. Elijah's standoff had occurred on Mount Carmel in ancient Israel. When the Lord answered Elijah's prayers and not those of the prophets of Baal, Elijah slaughtered them all. As of this writing, Howell is still waiting for the Lord to answer him. FBI and ATF agents, having lost four ATF agents in their initial assault February 28, are prepared to stop any further slaughter.
Howell is no Elijah. His carefully constructed persona fails to mask his religious delusions. He adopted the name David Koresh to symbolize his belief that he is God's Anointed for today. David was God's anointed as the king of Israel; Koresh is a designation of the Persian king Cyrus, who was ordained by God (Isaiah 45:1) to authorize and finance the rebuilding of the Jewish temple after the Babylonian captivity (2 Chronicles 36). When outsiders, including the media and law enforcement call him "David Koresh" he says that proves even his enemies know he is God's Anointed. He claims to be Jesus Christ, the "Lamb" of Revelation 5, and God's avenger against the world.
A shy, reclusive ninth-grade dropout from Texas had evolved into a despotic cult leader, able to command hundreds of followers and hold off 400 federal agents for days outside his dusty Mount Carmel compound.
The Cult
Vernon Howell's cult traces its origin to 1929, when Bulgarian immigrant Victor Houteff, dissatisfied with his own Seventh Day Adventist church in Los Angeles, broke away and moved to Texas to start his own church, which he called "the Shepherd's Rod." The Seventh Day Adventists have a tradition, started by founder Ellen G. White, of accepting modern-day prophecy and of expecting the imminent return of Jesus Christ in judgment. Ironically, one of Houteff's contentions with the Seventh Day Adventist church was that it was not pacifistic enough -- he disagreed with its practice of approving member participation in the armed forces in noncombat positions.
At the beginning of World War II Houteff changed the group's name to Davidic Seventh-day Adventists. When he died in 1957, his wife, Florence, assumed control and prophesied that the Second Coming of Christ would occur by April 22, 1959. Florence resigned from leadership of her 1,400 member group when the prophesy failed.
The Davidic Seventh-day Adventists split during 1959, the core of the group remaining near Waco, Texas and eventually assuming the name "Branch Davidians" under the leadership of the Roden family. In 1981 Vernon Howell joined the group as handyman assistant to then-leader Lois Roden. In 1983, when Lois' son, George, assumed control of the group, Howell unsuccessfully fought him for control. Howell returned to the headquarters in 1987, led a gun battle against George, was acquitted of attempted murder charges, and assumed control of the group in 1988. From 1986 - 1991 he recruited new members in Canada, Hawaii, California, England, and Australia; and then concentrated on rebuilding and fortifying the headquarters compound, "Mount Carmel," during 1992.
Distinctive teachings of the Branch Davidians include that Howell is Jesus Christ, that they will be God's instruments to implement God's final judgment, that Howell, destined to be a martyr, is entitled to 140 wives, and that the Sabbath must be observed from sundown Friday through sundown Sunday.
The Man
Vernon Howell was born in 1960 and spent his childhood in Tyler, Texas. He was described as shy and reclusive, and diagnosed with "learning disabilities." He dropped out of school in the ninth grade, but claims to have memorized the New Testament by the time he was twelve.
At nineteen Howell was baptized into the Seventh Day Adventist church, but was asked to leave scarcely two years later because of behavior and scripture interpretation problems. That same year, 1981, he joined the Rodens' Branch Davidian sect.
Over the next seven years he grew into his later grandiose persona. He built his base of power, took over the sect, accumulated one legal wife (Rachel, then 14) and dozens of other women, and began preaching his version of the end of the world and the Last Judgment. He also pursued his lifelong love of hard rock music, associating with rock musicians, playing with different bands, and recruiting players for "God's" band.
Howell's dire predictions of coming warfare and his own martyrdom date to 1983 or 1984, when, according to one ex-member, "he was always teaching that he was going to be killed and going to be a martyr." Another ex-member recalled Howell's preoccupation with violence, recounting, "The night I met Koresh . . . he asked me, 'Would you die for Christ?' I said I guess so. He said, 'Would you kill for him?' I said no. He turned to my friend and said, 'Hey, you just brought me another weak Christian.'" The defense attorney for Howell and his followers in the trial over the 1987 gunfight with Roden remembered, "Vernon had told them that some day somebody was going to be coming for them, and that they better be ready."
Perhaps the most eerie connection between Howell and violence is his own interpretations of select Bible passages. He identifies himself with Elijah, who used God's power to defeat the false prophets of Baal at biblical Israel's Mount Carmel. He identifies with David, the king who subdued the enemies of God through warfare. He takes his last name, Koresh, a designation of the Persian king Cyrus, because he believes he, like Cyrus, is anointed by God to re-establish the true faith by destroying the ungodly. Most importantly, he identifies himself with the Second Coming of Jesus Christ, especially as Christ is described in Revelation 5, 10, and 18 -- the avenging Son of God who will destroy all the unrighteous with his heavenly army. One of his favorite self-descriptions is from Isaiah 11:4 -- "He shall strike the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of His lips He shall slay the wicked." Taking the language of Isaiah 63 and Revelation 18, he believes the "Day of Vengeance" has come, and he is the executioner.
The Shootout
The stage was set. Howell, now 33, the same age as Jesus at His death, worked by his own prophetic agenda. He was ready for war. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (BATF) agents, working a nine month investigation which involved informants, surveillance, and undercover infiltration, were convinced that Howell was stockpiling illegal weapons and explosives, and in addition was propagating illegal activities including child abuse and unlawful intercourse with minors (He is said to take new "wives" when they are between 11 and 14 years old). The plights of the women and especially the children gave the investigation more impetus, and the BATF made its move to serve search and arrest warrants around 9:30 a.m. Sunday, February 28.
Within forty-five minutes, four ATF agents were dead, 15 wounded, and three cult members were later confirmed dead. Howell himself claimed to have been shot in the abdomen. ATF spokespersons tried to explain the debacle, surmising that someone had tipped Howell off minutes before the raid, noting that they were unaware of the .50 caliber armor-piercing machine gun in the control tower, and also pointing out that, with so many women and children in the compound, they were unable to return fire through walls at unseen targets, while Howell's followers shot indiscriminately through walls at the agents.
After the initial assault, a cease fire allowed ATF agents to remove their dead and wounded, and the long standoff began. Nearby residents noted that Howell's followers had stockpiled supplies. FBI spokesmen noted that the compound was largely self-sufficient with its own wells and supplies, and the members used to doing without electricity or indoor plumbing.
Throughout the next five days, Howell and federal officials negotiated the intermittent release of 20 children and 2 adults. By Friday, March 5, 106 individuals were left inside the compound, including Howell. At first Howell had telephone access to the media and granted interviews to the Associated Press and CNN as well as other journalists. However, the FBI later cut his direct communication with anyone but them. Howell resorted to making promises in exchange for having his taped messages, delivered by children as they left, aired on radio. Tuesday, March 2, he promised everyone would surrender peacefully if his 58 minute audio cassette message was aired "nationally." Several Texas radio stations aired the message, a rambling, disjointed survey of dozens of disconnected Bible verses, but Howell rescinded his promise to give up. He declared that God had told him not to leave, and he would take further action only when God told him what to do. Given his teachings concerning violence and martyrdom, many ex-members and cult experts are concerned that the standoff cannot end without further bloodshed.
One hundred seemingly normal, rational people followed him to almost certain death. But as one person agreed, it's easy to suspend disbelief, to become caught up in a charismatic leader's vision, as one person put it, "When you first see him. . . you think, 'Who's this guy kidding?' But when he's talking, it's like something comes over you and you get swept up with it. A little bit of charm and you get to the point where you believe this, you believe that, and you come so far, it's just that you believe all of it." And the world sits, mesmerized by live television coverage and screaming newspaper headlines, swept up ourselves, unwittingly, into one madman's vision of the end.
Gretchen Passantino
Lessons from Waco
By Gretchen Passantino
Copyright 1992 by Bob and Gretchen Passantino. Reproduction or publication of the content in any manner, without express permission of the author is prohibited.
This article first appeared in World Magazine
With excruciating deliberation, the FBI executed successive steps toward peacefully ending their armed standoff with Branch Davidian cult members near Waco, Texas. They called on years of hostage negotiation experience, panels of forensic psychology experts, teams of crisis intervention specialists, numerous religious, biblical, theological, and cult advisors, and the best anti-terrorist authorities. Step-by-step they narrowed the compound perimeters, restricted outside contacts, disrupted sleep and daily habits, and pressed the hoped-for peaceful resolution.
But on Monday, April 19, David Koresh and 86 Branch Davidians, including up to 24 children, died in a firestorm of gunfire, propane, lantern oil, and exploding munitions. Nine adults survived the end to the tense 51 day siege begun February 28 when Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms agents were attacked attempting to serve arrest and search warrants at the compound for illegal arms and ammunition. In that initial skirmish four ATF agents were killed, 15 wounded, and perhaps as many as 10 cult members were killed.
As congressional hearings continue and federal officials investigate, the religious aspects of the Waco disaster will be an important part of their deliberations. Were Koresh's religious convictions weighed heavily enough? Were his followers' fanatical loyalty and resultant actions properly guaged? Was there any way religious insight could have saved lives?
Most agree Koresh's religious convictions were accurately considered. Koresh was convinced that he was the Lamb of God, that God had appointed him the executor of God's judgment, and that he and his followers were destined for firey, deadly battle. Koresh's last two letters, included challenges such as "I AM your God and you will bow under my feet . . . I AM your life and your death. . . . Fear Me, for I have you in My snare."
Religious researcher Phillip Arnold attempted to convince Koresh of an alternate, non-violent understanding of apocalyptic scriptures Koresh applied to the siege. Koresh's attorney, Dick DeGuerin, tried to negotiate a peaceful surrender. And yet neither produced any wavering by Koresh from his personal Armaggeddon. As FBI lawyer Danny Coulson remarked, "Inside [the compound] he's God. Outside, he's an inmate on trial for his life. What was he going to do?"
Even given the inevitability of Koresh's self-destruction, there is some indication that the FBI could have anticipated more accurately the final results through more accurate religious analysis. The FBI was confident the Davidian mothers instinctively would send their children out of the way of the tear gas and demolition, and yet their calculations did expect the mothers' absolute conviction that sending their children out would be to destine them to death at the hands of the enemy. A Justice department official, speaking with the clarity of hindsight, remarked, "This wasn't a normal hostage situation. . . . Not only were they there, they were willing to do anything for this person."
The Branch Davidians believed Koresh's prophecies concerning the inevitability of their martyrdom by fire. Koresh's favorite apocalyptic scriptures speak of destruction (Revelation 11:5), judgment (Revelation 8:5), and cleansing by fire (1 Corinthians 3:13-15). Koresh often compared himself to the prophet Elijah, who challenged the prophets of the fase gods in ancient Israel. He told the story of how Elijah dared the enemies to display divine power through their sacrifices. They failed, and the true God Yahweh sent fire from heaven to consume Elijah's sacrifice on Mount Carmel. The false prophets fled, only to be slaughtered by Elijah. Koresh was their Elijah, they were the sacrifice, and the federal forces were the false prophets destined for destruction. Whether or not the Davidians set the initial fires, they found themselves cast in the divine drama prefigured by Elijah and consumated by David Koresh. In the end, whether they welcomed the flames or were forced by Koresh's indominatable will, there was no escape.
Could the FBI have devised some alternative designed to frustrate fulfillment of Koresh's fire images? Perhaps. Attorney General Janet Reno said, "based on what we know now, obviously [what we did] was wrong." But the playwright of the drama wrote only one ending: death and destruction.
We will learn from this tragedy. Law enforcement, psychologists, politicians, talk show hosts, and bureaucrats will suggest legislation, policies, and plans to prevent another Mount Carmel, just as they did after 1978's mass deaths of 913 Peoples' Temple members in Jonestown, Guyana. But laws and strategies don't use the most powerful weapons we have as members of a free society: individual commitment to rationality and personal religious responsibility.
Gretchen Passantino
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Answers In Action
P.O. Box 2067
Costa Mesa, California 92628
(949) 646-9042
Answers In Action c/o aia@answers.org
CULTS
AIA, Promise Keepers: An Answers In Action Summary Opinion
It is our opinion that the Promise Keepers Christian men's movement is an over-all Christian movement attempting to encourage Christian men to fulfill their biblical potential as individuals and as family members. We do not condemn the movement, and, in fact, encourage its leaders to continue modifying its content and presentation to achieve a more biblically complete and pure focus. However, there are several areas of concern that restrict us from an unqualified endorsement, and which we believe must be addressed and corrected by the Promise Keepers leadership. Additionally, there are some general concerns for any large, event-oriented movement.
Areas of Agreement
* Strong biblical focus
* Emphasis on individual responsibility for growth in Christ
* Encouragement for discipleship through positive Christian role models
* Commitment to biblical family leadership and service
* Recognition of the necessity for spiritually mature and intact families
* Open respect for masculine spiritual and emotional growth
Areas of Disagreement
* Promise Keepers promoted author Robert Hicks, whose teachings combine common sense advice and psychobabble with Christian vocabulary and New Age motivational/positive confession ideas.
* Promise Keepers distributed thousands of copies of Hicks' book, The Masculine Journey, which has serious theological deficiencies.
NOTE: Promise Keepers, to our knowledge, no longer promotes Hicks or his books.
* Promise Keepers speakers are not always theologically sound, biblically centered, mature Christian speakers. (For example, they have repeatedly promoted T. D. Jakes, a United Pentecostal pastor/evangelist who denies -- along with his denomination -- the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity and promotes baptismal regeneration.)
* Promise Keepers has not done a careful job of distinguishing between white, middle-class American social expectations and true biblical spiritual discipline and maturity.
Areas of General Concern
* Events such as Promise Keepers tend to feed our unbiblical assumption that a single event or experience can transform our lives on a permanent basis.
* Mass audiences tend to enable the individual to lose himself in the crowd and thus more easily evade personal responsibility.
* Mass events and movements tend to reflect the cultural and ethnic habits of their founders and leaders and thus inadvertently tend to exclude those from other cultural and ethnic backgrounds.
* Gender exclusive movements are susceptible to subtle and unintended promotion of gender division rather than gender unity in Christ.
While we do not without reservation endorse the Promise Keepers movement, we recognize that many Christian men who attend will be spiritually benefitted. We do have positive expectations for the movement as it matures. We will continue to review the movement and change our summary as necessary.
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Answers In Action
P.O. Box 2067
Costa Mesa, California 92628
(949) 646-9042
Answers In Action c/o aia@answers.org
It is our opinion that the Promise Keepers Christian men's movement is an over-all Christian movement attempting to encourage Christian men to fulfill their biblical potential as individuals and as family members. We do not condemn the movement, and, in fact, encourage its leaders to continue modifying its content and presentation to achieve a more biblically complete and pure focus. However, there are several areas of concern that restrict us from an unqualified endorsement, and which we believe must be addressed and corrected by the Promise Keepers leadership. Additionally, there are some general concerns for any large, event-oriented movement.
Areas of Agreement
* Strong biblical focus
* Emphasis on individual responsibility for growth in Christ
* Encouragement for discipleship through positive Christian role models
* Commitment to biblical family leadership and service
* Recognition of the necessity for spiritually mature and intact families
* Open respect for masculine spiritual and emotional growth
Areas of Disagreement
* Promise Keepers promoted author Robert Hicks, whose teachings combine common sense advice and psychobabble with Christian vocabulary and New Age motivational/positive confession ideas.
* Promise Keepers distributed thousands of copies of Hicks' book, The Masculine Journey, which has serious theological deficiencies.
NOTE: Promise Keepers, to our knowledge, no longer promotes Hicks or his books.
* Promise Keepers speakers are not always theologically sound, biblically centered, mature Christian speakers. (For example, they have repeatedly promoted T. D. Jakes, a United Pentecostal pastor/evangelist who denies -- along with his denomination -- the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity and promotes baptismal regeneration.)
* Promise Keepers has not done a careful job of distinguishing between white, middle-class American social expectations and true biblical spiritual discipline and maturity.
Areas of General Concern
* Events such as Promise Keepers tend to feed our unbiblical assumption that a single event or experience can transform our lives on a permanent basis.
* Mass audiences tend to enable the individual to lose himself in the crowd and thus more easily evade personal responsibility.
* Mass events and movements tend to reflect the cultural and ethnic habits of their founders and leaders and thus inadvertently tend to exclude those from other cultural and ethnic backgrounds.
* Gender exclusive movements are susceptible to subtle and unintended promotion of gender division rather than gender unity in Christ.
While we do not without reservation endorse the Promise Keepers movement, we recognize that many Christian men who attend will be spiritually benefitted. We do have positive expectations for the movement as it matures. We will continue to review the movement and change our summary as necessary.
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Answers In Action
P.O. Box 2067
Costa Mesa, California 92628
(949) 646-9042
Answers In Action c/o aia@answers.org
CULTS
Overcoming The Bondage Of Victimization
A Critical Evaluation of Cult Mind Control Theories
© 1994 by Bob and Gretchen Passantino.
This article first appeared in Cornerstone Magazine
"You've got to get my daughter back," Margaret pleaded. "She was such a beautiful girl, such a good student! It's like she's another person. She used to think for herself, she used to spend time with us. Now her whole life is consumed by the Center. Please help us -- I don't care what it costs or how long it takes!"
Margaret's adult daughter had joined a religious cult, and she was now talking to an exit counselor, a professional who specialized in "interventions" for persons supposedly trapped under mind control in cultic movements.
The exit counselor explained that Margaret's daughter was a victim of mind control and described its four components: (1) behavior control, (2) thought control, (3) emotional control, and (4) information control. He said these techniques had combined to rob her daughter of the ability to make responsible and rational choices. The counselor informed them that neither the family nor the daughter were to blame for this cult involvement: at the right time, mind control could bring anyone into a cult.
The exit counselor said he would seek to break through her daughter's bondage to the cult leader and restore her to mental, emotional, and physical freedom. He assured her his work was not the same as the deprogrammers of the 1980s who forcibly kidnapped cult members and held them against their will. If the intervention were successful, Margaret's daughter would return to the mental stability she possessed before joining. Away from the pressures of the cult, she would be free to make an informed religious choice, unlike the controlled "choices" presented to her while in the group.
Finally, the terms of the agreement were discussed. Margaret assured the exit counselor that her daughter had voluntarily agreed to come home for the weekend specifically to discuss her devotion to the Center. The daughter understood that her mother and father would have a knowledgeable friend with them to speak with her, though she did not realize that the "friend" would be the exit counselor. For the fairly typical sum of $3,000 plus expenses, the exit counselor and his assistant would devote the next four days to the intervention. Of course, there were no guarantees: some ex-cultists needed additional in-patient counseling at a special "recovery" center, and one study put deprogramming failure rates at above 35 percent.
Margaret left her meeting with the exit counselor with confidence and optimism. With a trained professional, a backlog support of sociological and psychological literature, and her own determination to rescue her daughter, Margaret actually looked forward to the coming weekend.
Countless times across America scenes like this are played out for real as desperate parents of adult cult converts seek to understand how their children could change so drastically and pledge their lives to bizarre, exclusivistic religious movements. For many people, especially secular cult observers, the theory of mind control is used to explain this phenomenon. The cult mind control model is so commonly raised in explanation that many people assume its validity without question.
In this article, we look behind the assumptions of the mind control model and uncover the startling reality that "cult mind control" is, at best, a distorted misnomer for cult conversion that robs individuals of personal moral responsibility. While mind control model advocates rightly point out that cults often practice deception, emotional manipulation, and other unsavory recruitment tactics, we believe a critical, well-reasoned examination of the evidence disproves the cult mind control model and instead affirms the importance of informed, biblically based religious commitment.
Assumptions Of Mind Control
The theory of cult mind control is part of a contemporary adversarial approach to many cults, new religious movements, and non-traditional churches. In this approach sociological and psychological terminology has been substituted for Christian terminology. Cult involvement is no longer described as religious conversion, but as mind control induction. Cult membership is not characterized as misplaced religious zeal but as programming. And the cultist who leaves his group is no longer described as redeemed, but as returned to a neutral religious position. And rather than evangelism of cult members, we now have "intervention counseling."
And biblical apologetics has been replaced by cognitive dissonance techniques. A parent's plea has changed from "How can my adult child be saved?" to "How can my adult child revert to his/her pre-cult personality?" Biblical analysis and evangelism of the cults has become overshadowed by allegedly "value neutral" social science descriptions and therapy-oriented counseling.
The principal assumptions of the cult mind control model can be summarized under eight categories:
1. Cults' ability to control the mind supersedes that of the best military "brainwashers."
2. Cult recruits become unable to think or make decisions for themselves.
3. Cult recruits assume "cult" personalities and subsume their core personalities.
4. Cultists cannot decide to leave their cults.
5. A successful intervention must break the mind control, find the core personality, and return the individual to his/her pre-cult status.
6. Psychology and sociology are used to explain cult recruitment, membership, and disaffection.
7. Religious conversion and commitment may be termed "mind control" if it meets certain psychological and sociological criteria, regardless of its doctrinal or theological standards.
8. The psychological and sociological standards which define mind control are not absolute, but fall in a relative, subjective continuum from "acceptable" social and/or religious affiliation to "unacceptable."
According to most cult mind control model advocates, no one is immune to the right mind control tactics used at the right time. Anyone is susceptible. For example, Steven Hassan, recognized as a premier source for the cult mind control model, writes in his book, Combatting Cult Mind Control, "Anyone, regardless of family background, can be recruited into a cult. The major variable is not the person's family but the cult recruiter's level of skill." Dr. Paul Martin, evangelical director of a rehabilitation center for former cultists, writes,
"But the truth of the matter is, virtually anyone can get involved in a cult under the right circumstances. . . . Regardless of one's spiritual or psychological health, whether one is weak or strong, cultic involvement can happen to anyone."
Evangelical exit counselor Craig Branch told us in an interview that, even though he was extremely knowledgable and experienced regarding cult mind control, he still could be caught by cult mind control administered at the right time by the right person.
The cult mind control model is based on a fundamental conviction that the cultist becomes unable to make responsible and rational choices or decisions (particularly the choice to leave the group), and that psychological techniques are the most effective ways to free them to make decisions once more. This foundation is non-negotiable to the mind control model, and is at the root of what we consider so flawed about the mind control concept.
We find this foundational conviction assumed in a 1977 article describing recovery from cult mind control by evangelical sociologist Dr. Ronald Enroth, who quotes Dr. Margaret Singer, an outspoken advocate of the cult mind control model:
In a situation removed from the reinforcing pressures of the cult, the ex-members are encouraged to think for themselves so that they are "once again in charge of their own volition and their own decision-making."
Hassan asserts that, both from his personal testimony and his field experience, cult recruits cannot think for themselves or initiate decisions:
Members [of the Unification Church] . . . become totally dependent upon the group for financial and emotional support, and lose the ability to act independently of it.
Paul Martin asserts that cult mind control renders its victims virtually unresponsible for their actions or beliefs:
. . . the process whereby he or she was drawn into the cult was a subtle but powerful force over which he or she had little or no control and therefore they need not feel either guilt or shame because of their experience.
Cult mind control must be distinguished from "mere" deception, influence, or persuasion. At the core of the distinctive of mind control is the idea that the individual becomes unable to make autonomous personal choices, not simply that his or her choices have been predicated on something false. British sociologist Eileen Barker, a critic of the mind control concept, points out this difference:
Recruitment that employs deception should, however, be distinguished from "brainwashing" or "mind control." If people are the victims of mind control, they are rendered incapable of themselves making the decision as to whether or not to join a movement -- the decision is made for them. If, on the other hand, it is just deception that is being practised, converts will be perfectly capable of making a decision -- although they might make a different decision were they basing their choice on more accurate information.
Fundamentally, the mind control model assumes inability to choose, while deception interferes with the accuracy of the knowledge one uses to make a choice.
Objection: The Brainwashing Connection
Representatives of the mind control model contradictorily both distance mind control from classic brainwashing and yet also see continuity between cult mind control and the classic brainwashing attempts in the 1950s by North Koreans and Chinese among American prisoners of war and by American CIA researchers. When critics of the mind control model point out the abysmal failures of classic brainwashing (discussed later in this article), advocates like Michael Langone say they have "misrepresented the critics' [of the cults] [supporters of the mind control model] position by portraying them as advocates of a robotization theory of cult conversion based on The Manchurian Candidate."
However, there is also concensus among mind control model advocates that classic brainwashing is the precursor to contemporary cult mind control. Psychologist Dr. Margaret Singer underscores this connection in her preface to this same Langone book, Recovery from Cults:
[M]y interest [in cult psychology and mind control] began during the Korean War era when I worked at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research and studied thought-reform, influence, and intense indoctrination programs. Since then, I have continued the study of group influence.
In the 1960s I began to heed the appearance of cults and heard the descriptions of hundreds of parents who noticed certain changes in the personality, demeanor, and attitudes of their young-adult offspring who had become involved in cults. . . . The cults created programs of social and psychological influence that were effective for their goals. And I noticed especially that what had been added to the basic thought-reform programs seen in the world in the 1950s was the new cultic groups' use of pop psychology techniques for further manipulating guilt, fear, and defenses.
This contradictory embracing and rejecting of the brainwashing connection is partially reconciled only by the nonsubstantive differences pointed out by mind control model supporters: (1) "Brainwashing" is considered primitive and often ineffective; (2) "Mind control" is claimed to be extremely powerful and compelling.
Hassan says, "Today, many techniques of mind control exist that are far more sophisticated than the brainwashing techniques used in World War II and the Korean War", and explains further:
Mind control is not brainwashing. . . .
Brainwashing is typically coercive. The person knows at the outset that he is in the hands of an enemy. It begins with a clear demonstration of the respective roles -- who is prisoner and who is jailer -- and the prisoner experiences an absolute minimum of choice. Abusive mistreatment, even torture, is usually involved. . . .
Mind control, also called "thought reform," is more subtle and sophisticated. Its perpetrators are regarded as friends or peers, so the person is much less defensive. He unwittingly participates by cooperating with his controllers and giving them private information that he does not know will be used against him. The new belief system is internalized into a new identity structure.
Mind control involves little or no overt physical abuse. . . . The individual is deceived and manipulated -- not directly threatened -- into making the prescribed choices. On the whole, he responds positively to what is done to him.
Even though the evidence shows the unreliability and limits of hypnosis, Hassan also argues that "hypnotic processes are combined with group dynamics to create a potent indoctrination effect . . . . Destructive cults commonly induce trances in their members through lengthy indoctrination sessions . . . . I have seen many strong-willed people hypnotized and made to do things they would never normally do." Hassan states that hypnosis enables mind control perpetrators to increase their success rates impressively above what is possible through other mind control techniques.
Despite attempts to distinguish the generations of mind control development, there are no qualitative differences and what was once "brainwashing" became "snapping," which now is "mind control," "coercive persuasion," "menticide," "thought reform," etc. Each term focuses, however, on the power of the cult recruiters and on the inability of the recruit to think and/or decide independently from the cult.
However, it stretches one's credulity to believe that what CIA, Russian, Korean, and Chinese highly trained and technologically supported experts could not accomplish under extremes of mental, emotional, and physical abuse, self-styled modern messiahs like David hgate (high school dropout), Charles Manson (grade school dropout), and Hare Krishna founder Braphupada (self-educated) accomplished on a daily basis and on a massive scale with control methods measurably inferior to those of POW camp torturers. Do we really believe that what the Soviets couldn't do to Alexander Solzhenitsyn during years of forced labor and torture in the Gulag, Sun Myung Moon could have done by "love bombing" for one week at an idyllic wilderness retreat? Sociologists Bromley and Shupe point out the absurdity of such a notion:
Finally, the brainwashing notion implied that somehow these diverse and unconnected movements had simultaneously discovered and implemented highly intrusive behavioral modification techniques. Such serendipity and coordination was implausible given the diverse backgrounds of the groups at issue. Furthermore, the inability of highly trained professionals responsible for implementing a variety of modalities for effecting individual change, ranging from therapy to incarceration, belie claims that such rapid transformation can routinely be accomplished by neophytes against an individual's will.
Objection: The Deterministic Fault
We believe the data presented here shows that people join, stay in, and leave cults on their own responsibilities, even if their decisions may have been influenced or affected by deceit, pressure, emotional appeal, or other means. We do not believe the evidence supports the mind control model. In this article we express the concerns and fears of conservative, evangelical, and knowledgable counter-cult apologists not only our own concerns but those of other counter-cult workers (Christian and non- Christian) who firmly believe that the mind control model misdiagnoses the problem, mis-prescribes the solution, and (for Christians) is contrary to a biblical cult evangelism model.
Those holding to the mind control model have made the generalization that most cults have internal social pressures and religious practices which, if not identical in nature, are similar in effect; and that average cult members are similarly affected by these teachings, techniques, and practices. We reject this generalization, though we will grant -- and in fact have stated publicly -- that many cults have made deceptive claims, used faulty logic, misrepresented their beliefs, burdened their followers with unscriptural feelings of guilt, and sought to bring people into financial or moral compromise to unethical demands. Yet it does not necessarily or automatically follow that these pressures, practices, or demands remove an individual's personal responsibility for his or her actions.
The cult mind control model assumes that a combination of pressure and deception necessarily disables personal responsibility. Exit counselor Hassan recognizes that the cult mind control model (which he has adopted) is incompatible with the traditional philosophical and Christian view of man as a responsible moral agent:
First of all, accepting that unethical mind control can affect anybody challenges the age-old philosophical notion (the one on which our current laws are based) that man is a rational being, responsible for, and in control of, his every action. Such a world view does not allow for any concept of mind control.
Objection: The Double - Bind
Hassan provides no means of knowing, testing, or proving whether people who are under emotional pressure, personal stress, or actual deception are in fact "not responsible" for their actions or not making free choices. Nor does Hassan suggest any way to clearly determine when techniques of "influence" or "persuasion" might become so great that one being influenced is no longer responsible, no longer rational, or no longer has a personal will. Medical doctor J. Thomas Ungerleider and Ph.D. David K. Wellish show the fallacious presuppositions used by the deprogrammers (now exit counselors):
If the member never does renounce the cult then he or she is regarded by the deprogrammers as an unsuccessful attempt or failed deprogramming, not as one who now has free will and has still chosen to remain with the cult.
Whether this is called this circular reasoning or a "double-bind," the net result is that the "proof" that the cultist has been coerced is unfalsifiable, and he cannot prove that he has freely chosen to join his group. If you leave the cult as a result of deprogramming (or exit counseling), that proves you were under mind control. If you return to the cult, that proves you are under mind control. The standard for determining mind control is not some objective evaluation of mental health or competency, but merely the assumed power of mind control the critic accords to the cult.
Recently certain of the model's proponents seem to blur the definition of mind control, perhaps because there is no corroborating evidence that mind control techniques produce qualitatively different results in religious conversion.
It appears that some evangelicals especially have problems reconciling a classic cult mind control model with other religious considerations and with later developments in this area. For example, sociologist Ronald Enroth, an evangelical professor at Christian Westmont College, is reluctant to be perceived as a mind control model advocate, even though he his support appeared clear in the late 1970s and continues at least tacitly today.
Enroth promoted the model in his 1977 book Youth, Brainwashing, and the Extremist Cults and also in a 1977 Christian magazine article, "Cult/Countercult." His most recent book (1992), Churches that Abuse, is peppered with language concerning victimization, lack of personal control, and autocratic decision-making control. Additionally, he endorses the work of other mind control advocates such as Hassan (1990) and Singer, and serves on the editorial advisory board of the pre-eminent mind control model journal, Cultic Studies Journal, edited by Langone. In a personal letter to us he describes Martin and Langone's Christian Research Journal "Viewpoint" article as "a helpful correction to the earlier article and it, too, reflects my own thinking re exit counseling, even though I have never personally witnessed or engaged in formal exit counseling."
Despite these several apparent (sometimes tacit) endorsements of the mind control model, in the same letter to us he declared, "You do NOT have my permission to represent my 1977 writing about thought reform and brainwashing as my current position on the topic. That doesn't mean that I necessarily disavow what I said then; it means that it is not academically/professionally current and I have not had time nor inclination to update, in writing, in this area."
Geri-Ann Galanti and co-authors Philip Zimbardo and Susan Andersen reflect this change in the recent book, Recovery from Cults, edited by Michael Langone of the American Family Foundation.
Galanti says that mind control (which she equates with brainwashing) "refers to the use of manipulative techniques that are for the most part extremely effective in influencing the behavior of others." These influence techniques work to change our beliefs and attitudes as well; we encouter these pressures constantly "in advertising, in schools, in military basic training, in the media." They are a part of the socialization process, a part of life, Galanti maintains.
Yet when describing her own visit to a Moonie indoctrination center, where contrary to expectations, she was allowed plenty of sleep, food, and to observe horsing around among the Moonies (some even joking about brainwashing!), Galanti concludes: "What I found was completely contrary to my expectations and served to underscore both the power and the subtlety of mind control." While she was there, she felt much of the experience to be a positive one.
Later, Galanti decides that what she really experienced, despite all evidence to the contrary, was an even more seductive, subversive form of mind control than she'd previously imagined could exist. It nearly fooled even her. In short, the lack of evidence for mind control among the Moonies was really evidence for just how insidious their methods of mind control had become! Such argumentation points to the frustrating nature of the belief in mind control; so often evidence offered against the mind control model is mis-used to illustrate how true it must be.
Zimbardo and Andersen offer a mind control definition similar to Galanti's: a tool to "manipulate others' thoughts, feelings, and behavior within a given context over a period of time . . . " The chapter deals at length with common uses of manipulation so that definitions of mind control techniques multiple to include anything from flattery to social etiquette to hard-of-hearing salesmen. Again, the move is apparently away from seeing mind control as insidious, powerful techniques that rob individuals of personal freedom, and toward a new, "broader" definition which sees mind control as a synonym for "means of persuasion." However, if mind control loses its distinctive power and unique techniques, then it ceases to have any relevance as a term descriptive of special cult indoctrination processes.
By almost interchanging the terms "persuasion" and "manipulation," Zimbardo and Anderson gloss over ethical, connotative differences between these two terms. Second, and more important, the new trend to define mind control to include nearly all "manipulative techniques" implicitly contradicts a key element of the traditional model, namely, that mind control renders its subjects unable to think rationally or choose independently.
A definition of mind control that removes its involuntary component is intrinsicaly at odds with the prevailing teachings of Singer, Langone, Hassan, Martin, and others that cult victims are unable to think for themselves or make decisions. Instead, it is more in agreement with the case we have been arguing -- that cult members are capable of independent thought and rational choice-making, but because of factual and spiritual deception, faulty presuppositions, fallacious reasoning, and improper religious commitments, they make unwise choices and adopt false beliefs instead.
Contemporary mind control model advocates want to have the best of both worlds: They want to distinguish cult recruitment techniques from normal socialization activities to substantiate their claims about the insidious powers of the cults, even to the point of pressing for anti-cult legislation; But as soon as anyone asks for concrete evidence and qualitative definitions, mind control becomes just another term for the myriads of forms of non-candid persuasion.
Objection: The Brainwashing Evidence
In addition to philosophical and logical problems with the cult mind control model, the evidence contradicts it. Neither brainwashing, mind control's supposed precursor, nor mind control itself, have any appreciable demonstrated effectiveness. Singer and other mind control model proponents are not always candid about this fact: The early brainwashing attempts were largely unsuccessful. Even though the Koreans and Chinese used extreme forms of physical coercion as well as persuasive coercion, very few individuals subjected to their techniques changed their basic world views or commitments.
The CIA also experimented with brainwashing. Though not using Korean or Chinese techniques of torture, beatings, and group dynamics, the CIA did experiment with drugs (including LSD) and medical therapies such as electroshock in their research on mind control. Their experiments failed to produce even one potential Manchurian Candidate, and the program was finally abandoned.
Although some mind control model advocates bring up studies that appear to provide objective data in support of their theories, such is not the case. These studies are generally flawed in several areas: (1) Frequently the respondents are not from a wide cross-section of ex-members but disproportionately are those who have been exit-counseled by mind control model advocates who tell them they were under mind control; (2) Frequently the sample group is so small its results cannot be fairly representative of cult membership in general; (3) It is almost impossible to gather data from the same individuals before cult affiliation, during cult affiliation, and after cult disaffection, so respondents are sometimes asked to answer as though they were not yet members, or as though they were still members, etc. Each of these flaws introduces unpredicatiblity and subjectivity that make such study results unreliable.
Objection: Low Recruitment Rates
The evidence against the effectiveness of mind control techniques is even more overwhelming. Studies show that the vast majority of young people approached by new religious movements (NRMs) never join despite heavy recruitment tactics. This low rate of recruitment provides ample evidence that whatever techniques of purported mind control are used as cult recruiting tools, they do not work on most people. Even of those interested enough to attend a recruitment seminar or weekend, the majority do not join the group. Eileen Barker documents that out of 1000 people persuaded by the Moonies to attend one of their overnight programs in 1979, 90% had no further involvement. Only 8% joined for more than one week, and less than 4% remained members in 1981, two years later:
". . . and, with the passage of time, the number of continuing members who joined in 1979 has continued to fall. If the calculation were to start from those who, for one reason or another, had visited one of the movement's centres in 1979, at least 999 out of every 1,000 of those people had, by the mid-1980s, succeeeded in resisting the persuasive techniques of the Unification Church."
Of particular importance is that this extremely low rate of conversion is known even to Hassan, the best-known mind control model advocate whose book is the standard text for introducing concerned parents to mind control/exit counseling. In his personal testimony of his own involvement with the Unification Church, he notes that he was the first convert to join at the center in Queens; that during the first three months of his membership he only recruited two more people; and that pressure to recruit new members was only to reach the goal of one new person per member per month, a surprisingly low figure if we are to accept the inevitable success of cult mind control techniques.
Objection: High Attrition Rates Additionally, natural attrition (people leaving the group without specific intervention) was much higher than the self-claimed 65% deprogramming success figure! It is far more likely a new convert would leave the cult within the first year of his membership than it is that he would become a long term member.
This data, confirming low rates of conversion and high rates of disaffection, is deadly to the mind control model. The data reveals that the theory of cult mind control is not confirmed by the statistical evidence. The reality is that people who have very real spiritual, emotional, and social needs are looking for fulfillment and signficance for their lives. Ill-equipped to test the false gospels of this world, they make poor decisions about their religious affiliations. Poor decisions, yes, but personally responsible decisions nontheless.
As Barker summarizes, "far more people have left the very NRMs from which people are most commonly deprogramed than have stayed in them, and the overwhelming majority of these people have managed to leave without the need for any physical coercion."
Objection: The Anti-Religious Bias Of Mind Control Assumptions
Although most secular mind control model advocates deny that they are critical of any particular beliefs, but only of practices, Shupe and Bromley note, "It quickly became apparent that brainwashing served as a conclusionary value judgment rather than as an analytic concept."
A look at the historical evidence underscores the anti-religious basis of the brainwashing/mind control model. As sociologists Anthony and Robbins note,
[I]n a sense the project of modern social science, particularly in its Enlightenment origins, has been to liberate man from the domination of retrogressive forces, particularly religion, which has often been seen as a source of involuntariness and a threat to personal autonomy, from which an individual would be liberated by "the science of freedom" (Gay, 1969). This view of religion had been present in the cruder early models of brainwashing such as Sargant (1957), who saw evangelical revivalism as a mode of brainwashing, and who commenced his studies after noting similarities between conversions to Methodism and Pavlovian experiments with dogs . . . (Robbins and Anthony, 1979).
William Sargant, approvingly cited by many cult mind control model advocates, also made statements arguing that Christian evangelistic preaching techniques are similar to communist brainwashing methods. As Sargant wrote in his Battle for the Mind:
Anyone who wishes to investigate the technique of brain-washing and eliciting confessions as practiced behind the Iron Curtain (and on this side of it, too, in certain police stations where the spirit of the law is flouted) would do well to start with a study of eighteenth-century American revivalism from the 1730s onward. The physiological mechanics seem the same, and the beliefs and behavior patterns implanted, especially among the puritans of New England, have not been surpassed for rigidity and intolerance even in Stalin's times in the U.S.S.R.
Sargant's anti-Christian bias is also reflected by Flo Conway and Jim Siegelman, 1970s popularizers of the cult mind control theory. Expressions of offense at the exclusive claims of Christianity appear in their bestselling book, Snapping. Some born-again Christians "shocked us considerably," they state, for telling us that "we would be condemned to Hell for the opinions we expressed and the beliefs we held." Among groups cited as suspect by Conway and Siegelman was Campus Crusade for Christ. The two miscontrues as a threat what Campus Crusade founder Bill Bright describes as conversion to Christ: "surrender of the intellect, the emotions, and the will -- the total person." Conway and Siegelman conclude: "In its similarity to the appeals of so many cult recruiters and lecturers, this traditional Christian doctrine -- and the suggestion contained within it -- takes on new and ominous overtones."
"What is the line between a cult and a legitimate religion?" Conway and Siegelman ask. "In America today that line cannot be categorically drawn. In the course of our investigation, however, it became clear to us that many Born Again Christians had been severed from their families, their pasts, and society as a whole as a result of a profound personal transformation. It is not in keeping with the purpose of this investigation to comment on the far-flung Evangelical movement in its entirety, but our research raised serious questions concerning the techniques used to bring about conversion in many Evangelical sects."
Conway, Siegleman, and many other anti-cult workers presuppose the harmfulness of any religious allegiance that includes exclusivity and total commitment. Looking back in history, such anti-religious bias is not uncommon. There were those who thought Thomas Aquinas and St. Francis of Assisi were mentally incompetent to make their religious commitments.
In short, there is no objective, evidential way to define groups that are "good" (not using mind control) versus groups that are "bad" (using mind control). Without evidence, the accusation of mind control against any group or individual becomes a matter of personal bias. Once one points to particular doctrines, teachings, or practices as inherently bad, one has abandoned the supposedly religiously "neutral" position of the cult mind control advocates and must make religious judgments. Although this is not the focus of this article, we note here that as evangelical Christians we openly admit that we make religious judgments regarding the cults, and that those religious judgments are based on the Bible, not on our own subjective opinions or some concensus of social science professionals.
Objection: Creating Victims
Many people who join cults want to help the needy, forsake materialism, or develop personal independence from their families, not necessarily bad goals, although misguided by false cult teachings. The cult mind control model, however, attributes cult membership primarily to mind control and thereby denigrates or discounts such positive activities and goals, misaffiliated to cults as they are.
The mind control model also fails to give proper weight to the role natural suggestibility plays in making one vulnerable to the cults. Highly suggestible people are especially susceptible to religious salesmanship as well as many other "sales pitches."
The cult mind control model instead focuses on victimization, that a cult member joins as a result of mind control and not as the result of personal choice. Adopting a "victimization" perspective actually strips the cult member of his capacity for rational activity. The cult mind control model epitomizes a "victim" mentality. Hassan explains his approach to counseling a cult member:
First, I demonstrate to him that he is in a trap -- a situation where he is psychologically disabled and can't get out. Second, I show him that he didn't originally choose to enter a trap. Third, I point out that other people in other groups are in similar traps. Fourth, I tell him that it is possible to get out of the trap.
This kind of victimization is very popular in our society today, although it has not demonstrated any evidential validity nor any ability to set the foundation for emotional or mental health.
Problems with the cult victimization idea can be illustrated by looking at other areas outside the new religous movements. We have the Bradshaw "model" of adults as "inner children" who never grew up because of their "dysfunctional" families. We have the many twelve-step spawned derivative groups where members seem to focus more on their powerlessness against whatever addictive "illness" they have than on another twelve-step maxim: personal responsibility. And we have the many "Adult Children" support groups where members uncover the sources of all their problems -- dysfunctional parents.
One of the most visible applications of the mind control model today is in the area of repressed memories of early childhood abuse (of satanic ritual abuse, simple child abuse, alien or UFO abduction, past lives, etc.). Amazingly, the mind control model is used to describe two contrasting portions of this problem. First, therapists and clients who believe they have uncovered previously repressed memories of early childhood abuse believe that the original abusers practice mind control on their victims. One of the most extreme examples of this is psychologist Corry Hammond, who postulates a sophisticated system of mind control he believes was developed from experimental Nazi systems.
Second, falsely accused parents and other family members often believe the mind control model, applied to the relationship between the therapist and the accusing client, explains how adult children could sincerely believe and accuse their own fathers, mothers, brothers, uncles, and grandparents of performing unspeakable horrors on them as children, including human sacrifice, rape, incest, mutilation, etc. Many times these adult children have publicly denounced their parents and refused any contact with them for years. Surely to believe such outrageous fictions, they must be under therapeutic mind control! Finally, once adult "survivors" come to the realization that their memories are false, they must deal with the reality that they have accused their loved ones of horrible atrocities. One alleged survivor, struggling to maintain belief in her alleged recovered memories, acknowledged this painful responsibility:
I wish I could say that I knew [my memories] were 100 percent true. But I can't. If they are all based on falsehoods, I deserve to be damned, and that is really tough. I've made some really important decisions that have affected a lot of people. I still get back to [the feeling that] the essence of the belief has to be true."
How could they have ever caused their families such anguish? They must have been victims of therapeutic mind control!
And yet, such a view fosters a crippling victimization that says, in effect, "you couldn't do anything to prevent this insidious mind control" and, consequently, what could you possibly do to protect yourself or your loved ones in the future?
Speaking about cults, Barker makes this clear, saying,
Those who leave by themselves may have concluded that they made a mistake and that they recognized that fact and, as a result, they did something about it: they left. Those who have been deprogrammed, on the other hand, are taught that is was not they who were responsible for joining; they were the victims of mind- control techniques -- and these prevented them from leaving. Research has shown that, unlike those who have been deprogrammed (and thereby taught that they had been brainwashed), those who leave voluntarily are extremely unlikely to believe that they were ever the victims of mind control.
An improper victimization model, whether used to understand cult recruitment, repressed memories, adult emotional distress, or false accusations of abuse does not provide the education, critical thinking apparatus, or coping mechanisms necessary to protect oneself from further victimization, and, most importantly, such theories do not focus on the life-transforming gospel as the ultimate solution.
Additionally, true victims, such as small children, victims of rape, robbery, or murder, those who truly are unable to predict or prevent their victimization, have their predicament cheapened and obscured by those who are not truly defenseless victims.
This model has become standard for many evangelical Christians who have therapists, attribute their current problems to "dysfunctional" relationships, and trace their personal inadequacies to emotionally harmful childhoods (everyone's a dysfunctional "adult child" of alcoholism, or abuse, or isolationism, or authoritarianism). Everyone is a victim. One doesn't need to be saved from one's own sins as much as from the sins of others. Psychology and sociology have replaced Scripture for understanding human behavior and developing emotionally and spiritually healthy persons. Yet nowhere in Scripture do we find support for the idea complaint first voiced by Eve that "the devil -- or the cult leader -- made me do it." One cannot remove human responsibility without also destroying human morality:
Some social scientists object to the idea that humans are free to choose. They claim that man is nothing but the result of biological, psychological, and sociological conditions, or the product of heredity and environment. Thus, B. F. Skinner holds that autonomous man is a myth. All of man's so-called "decisions" are actually determined by previous experience. Even some Christians believe that all of men's actions are determined by God . . . . , and that they have no free choice.
Such a view of man must be met head-on. If free choice is a myth, so is moral obligation. C. S. Lewis notes that a deterministic view brings about the abolition of man. In an impassioned plea he argues that you cannot strip men of autonomy without denuding them of responsibility: "In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful."
Objection: Theological Inconsistencies
If the cult recruiter's skill at manipulation is considered so coercive that members are not responsible for their own beliefs, actions, or even the decision to join/stay in the cult, then many biblical affirmations about personal responsibility and decision-making are jeopardized. To a secular mind control model advocate, this may seem a trivial objection. But several advocates are Christian evangelicals and must come to terms with the theological inconsistencies introduced when the cult mind control model is adopted.
For example, in the Garden, Satan personally appeared to orchestrate the temptation of Eve -- and who could be more persuasive? Our first parents succumbed to the temptation and were cast out of the Garden, and all of humanity thereafter have been penalized by this primal sin. If our first parents could be held morally responsible when confronted by the Ultimate Tempter, how is it that we seek to excuse ourselves or our offspring when confronted by human tempters of far less power, skill, and charisma?
Moreover, we observe that both Adam and Eve were penalized alike, even though the temptation was very well different for each. Eve's temptation was mediated by the direct approach of Satan; Adam's temptation occurred via his wife, and we are not told that Satan appeared to Adam as he did to Eve. Yet, regardless of whether Satan's presence was immediate or remote, firsthand or secondhand, both shared ethical culpability for their action.
It is also instructive to note that the second sin of Adam and Eve was blameshifting, the attempt to elude personal responsibility. Eve blamed the Serpent, and Adam blamed Eve. Though God loved them deeply, He did not accept this rationalization then, and He will not accept similar excuses made today for our own wrong beliefs and behavior.
Conclusion
This carefully focused evaluation has shown that the Bogey Man of cult mind control is nothing but a ghost story, good for inducing an adrenaline high and maintaining a crusade, but irrelevant to reality. The reality is that people who have very real spiritual, emotional, and social needs are looking for fulfillment and significance for their lives. Ill-equipped to test the false gospels of this world, they make poor decisions about their religious affiliations. Poor decisions, yes, but decisions for which they are personally responsible nonetheless.
As Christians who believe in an absolute standard of truth and religious reality, we cannot ignore the spiritual threat of the cults. We must promote critical thinking, responsible education, biblical apologetics, and Christian evangelism. We must recognize that those who join the cults, while morally responsible, are also spiritually ignorant. The power of the gospel (Romans 1:16) erases spiritual ignorance and provides the best opportunity possible for right moral and religious choices. "So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed" (John 8:36).
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Answers In Action
P.O. Box 2067
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Answers In Action c/o aia@answers.org
A Critical Evaluation of Cult Mind Control Theories
© 1994 by Bob and Gretchen Passantino.
This article first appeared in Cornerstone Magazine
"You've got to get my daughter back," Margaret pleaded. "She was such a beautiful girl, such a good student! It's like she's another person. She used to think for herself, she used to spend time with us. Now her whole life is consumed by the Center. Please help us -- I don't care what it costs or how long it takes!"
Margaret's adult daughter had joined a religious cult, and she was now talking to an exit counselor, a professional who specialized in "interventions" for persons supposedly trapped under mind control in cultic movements.
The exit counselor explained that Margaret's daughter was a victim of mind control and described its four components: (1) behavior control, (2) thought control, (3) emotional control, and (4) information control. He said these techniques had combined to rob her daughter of the ability to make responsible and rational choices. The counselor informed them that neither the family nor the daughter were to blame for this cult involvement: at the right time, mind control could bring anyone into a cult.
The exit counselor said he would seek to break through her daughter's bondage to the cult leader and restore her to mental, emotional, and physical freedom. He assured her his work was not the same as the deprogrammers of the 1980s who forcibly kidnapped cult members and held them against their will. If the intervention were successful, Margaret's daughter would return to the mental stability she possessed before joining. Away from the pressures of the cult, she would be free to make an informed religious choice, unlike the controlled "choices" presented to her while in the group.
Finally, the terms of the agreement were discussed. Margaret assured the exit counselor that her daughter had voluntarily agreed to come home for the weekend specifically to discuss her devotion to the Center. The daughter understood that her mother and father would have a knowledgeable friend with them to speak with her, though she did not realize that the "friend" would be the exit counselor. For the fairly typical sum of $3,000 plus expenses, the exit counselor and his assistant would devote the next four days to the intervention. Of course, there were no guarantees: some ex-cultists needed additional in-patient counseling at a special "recovery" center, and one study put deprogramming failure rates at above 35 percent.
Margaret left her meeting with the exit counselor with confidence and optimism. With a trained professional, a backlog support of sociological and psychological literature, and her own determination to rescue her daughter, Margaret actually looked forward to the coming weekend.
Countless times across America scenes like this are played out for real as desperate parents of adult cult converts seek to understand how their children could change so drastically and pledge their lives to bizarre, exclusivistic religious movements. For many people, especially secular cult observers, the theory of mind control is used to explain this phenomenon. The cult mind control model is so commonly raised in explanation that many people assume its validity without question.
In this article, we look behind the assumptions of the mind control model and uncover the startling reality that "cult mind control" is, at best, a distorted misnomer for cult conversion that robs individuals of personal moral responsibility. While mind control model advocates rightly point out that cults often practice deception, emotional manipulation, and other unsavory recruitment tactics, we believe a critical, well-reasoned examination of the evidence disproves the cult mind control model and instead affirms the importance of informed, biblically based religious commitment.
Assumptions Of Mind Control
The theory of cult mind control is part of a contemporary adversarial approach to many cults, new religious movements, and non-traditional churches. In this approach sociological and psychological terminology has been substituted for Christian terminology. Cult involvement is no longer described as religious conversion, but as mind control induction. Cult membership is not characterized as misplaced religious zeal but as programming. And the cultist who leaves his group is no longer described as redeemed, but as returned to a neutral religious position. And rather than evangelism of cult members, we now have "intervention counseling."
And biblical apologetics has been replaced by cognitive dissonance techniques. A parent's plea has changed from "How can my adult child be saved?" to "How can my adult child revert to his/her pre-cult personality?" Biblical analysis and evangelism of the cults has become overshadowed by allegedly "value neutral" social science descriptions and therapy-oriented counseling.
The principal assumptions of the cult mind control model can be summarized under eight categories:
1. Cults' ability to control the mind supersedes that of the best military "brainwashers."
2. Cult recruits become unable to think or make decisions for themselves.
3. Cult recruits assume "cult" personalities and subsume their core personalities.
4. Cultists cannot decide to leave their cults.
5. A successful intervention must break the mind control, find the core personality, and return the individual to his/her pre-cult status.
6. Psychology and sociology are used to explain cult recruitment, membership, and disaffection.
7. Religious conversion and commitment may be termed "mind control" if it meets certain psychological and sociological criteria, regardless of its doctrinal or theological standards.
8. The psychological and sociological standards which define mind control are not absolute, but fall in a relative, subjective continuum from "acceptable" social and/or religious affiliation to "unacceptable."
According to most cult mind control model advocates, no one is immune to the right mind control tactics used at the right time. Anyone is susceptible. For example, Steven Hassan, recognized as a premier source for the cult mind control model, writes in his book, Combatting Cult Mind Control, "Anyone, regardless of family background, can be recruited into a cult. The major variable is not the person's family but the cult recruiter's level of skill." Dr. Paul Martin, evangelical director of a rehabilitation center for former cultists, writes,
"But the truth of the matter is, virtually anyone can get involved in a cult under the right circumstances. . . . Regardless of one's spiritual or psychological health, whether one is weak or strong, cultic involvement can happen to anyone."
Evangelical exit counselor Craig Branch told us in an interview that, even though he was extremely knowledgable and experienced regarding cult mind control, he still could be caught by cult mind control administered at the right time by the right person.
The cult mind control model is based on a fundamental conviction that the cultist becomes unable to make responsible and rational choices or decisions (particularly the choice to leave the group), and that psychological techniques are the most effective ways to free them to make decisions once more. This foundation is non-negotiable to the mind control model, and is at the root of what we consider so flawed about the mind control concept.
We find this foundational conviction assumed in a 1977 article describing recovery from cult mind control by evangelical sociologist Dr. Ronald Enroth, who quotes Dr. Margaret Singer, an outspoken advocate of the cult mind control model:
In a situation removed from the reinforcing pressures of the cult, the ex-members are encouraged to think for themselves so that they are "once again in charge of their own volition and their own decision-making."
Hassan asserts that, both from his personal testimony and his field experience, cult recruits cannot think for themselves or initiate decisions:
Members [of the Unification Church] . . . become totally dependent upon the group for financial and emotional support, and lose the ability to act independently of it.
Paul Martin asserts that cult mind control renders its victims virtually unresponsible for their actions or beliefs:
. . . the process whereby he or she was drawn into the cult was a subtle but powerful force over which he or she had little or no control and therefore they need not feel either guilt or shame because of their experience.
Cult mind control must be distinguished from "mere" deception, influence, or persuasion. At the core of the distinctive of mind control is the idea that the individual becomes unable to make autonomous personal choices, not simply that his or her choices have been predicated on something false. British sociologist Eileen Barker, a critic of the mind control concept, points out this difference:
Recruitment that employs deception should, however, be distinguished from "brainwashing" or "mind control." If people are the victims of mind control, they are rendered incapable of themselves making the decision as to whether or not to join a movement -- the decision is made for them. If, on the other hand, it is just deception that is being practised, converts will be perfectly capable of making a decision -- although they might make a different decision were they basing their choice on more accurate information.
Fundamentally, the mind control model assumes inability to choose, while deception interferes with the accuracy of the knowledge one uses to make a choice.
Objection: The Brainwashing Connection
Representatives of the mind control model contradictorily both distance mind control from classic brainwashing and yet also see continuity between cult mind control and the classic brainwashing attempts in the 1950s by North Koreans and Chinese among American prisoners of war and by American CIA researchers. When critics of the mind control model point out the abysmal failures of classic brainwashing (discussed later in this article), advocates like Michael Langone say they have "misrepresented the critics' [of the cults] [supporters of the mind control model] position by portraying them as advocates of a robotization theory of cult conversion based on The Manchurian Candidate."
However, there is also concensus among mind control model advocates that classic brainwashing is the precursor to contemporary cult mind control. Psychologist Dr. Margaret Singer underscores this connection in her preface to this same Langone book, Recovery from Cults:
[M]y interest [in cult psychology and mind control] began during the Korean War era when I worked at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research and studied thought-reform, influence, and intense indoctrination programs. Since then, I have continued the study of group influence.
In the 1960s I began to heed the appearance of cults and heard the descriptions of hundreds of parents who noticed certain changes in the personality, demeanor, and attitudes of their young-adult offspring who had become involved in cults. . . . The cults created programs of social and psychological influence that were effective for their goals. And I noticed especially that what had been added to the basic thought-reform programs seen in the world in the 1950s was the new cultic groups' use of pop psychology techniques for further manipulating guilt, fear, and defenses.
This contradictory embracing and rejecting of the brainwashing connection is partially reconciled only by the nonsubstantive differences pointed out by mind control model supporters: (1) "Brainwashing" is considered primitive and often ineffective; (2) "Mind control" is claimed to be extremely powerful and compelling.
Hassan says, "Today, many techniques of mind control exist that are far more sophisticated than the brainwashing techniques used in World War II and the Korean War", and explains further:
Mind control is not brainwashing. . . .
Brainwashing is typically coercive. The person knows at the outset that he is in the hands of an enemy. It begins with a clear demonstration of the respective roles -- who is prisoner and who is jailer -- and the prisoner experiences an absolute minimum of choice. Abusive mistreatment, even torture, is usually involved. . . .
Mind control, also called "thought reform," is more subtle and sophisticated. Its perpetrators are regarded as friends or peers, so the person is much less defensive. He unwittingly participates by cooperating with his controllers and giving them private information that he does not know will be used against him. The new belief system is internalized into a new identity structure.
Mind control involves little or no overt physical abuse. . . . The individual is deceived and manipulated -- not directly threatened -- into making the prescribed choices. On the whole, he responds positively to what is done to him.
Even though the evidence shows the unreliability and limits of hypnosis, Hassan also argues that "hypnotic processes are combined with group dynamics to create a potent indoctrination effect . . . . Destructive cults commonly induce trances in their members through lengthy indoctrination sessions . . . . I have seen many strong-willed people hypnotized and made to do things they would never normally do." Hassan states that hypnosis enables mind control perpetrators to increase their success rates impressively above what is possible through other mind control techniques.
Despite attempts to distinguish the generations of mind control development, there are no qualitative differences and what was once "brainwashing" became "snapping," which now is "mind control," "coercive persuasion," "menticide," "thought reform," etc. Each term focuses, however, on the power of the cult recruiters and on the inability of the recruit to think and/or decide independently from the cult.
However, it stretches one's credulity to believe that what CIA, Russian, Korean, and Chinese highly trained and technologically supported experts could not accomplish under extremes of mental, emotional, and physical abuse, self-styled modern messiahs like David hgate (high school dropout), Charles Manson (grade school dropout), and Hare Krishna founder Braphupada (self-educated) accomplished on a daily basis and on a massive scale with control methods measurably inferior to those of POW camp torturers. Do we really believe that what the Soviets couldn't do to Alexander Solzhenitsyn during years of forced labor and torture in the Gulag, Sun Myung Moon could have done by "love bombing" for one week at an idyllic wilderness retreat? Sociologists Bromley and Shupe point out the absurdity of such a notion:
Finally, the brainwashing notion implied that somehow these diverse and unconnected movements had simultaneously discovered and implemented highly intrusive behavioral modification techniques. Such serendipity and coordination was implausible given the diverse backgrounds of the groups at issue. Furthermore, the inability of highly trained professionals responsible for implementing a variety of modalities for effecting individual change, ranging from therapy to incarceration, belie claims that such rapid transformation can routinely be accomplished by neophytes against an individual's will.
Objection: The Deterministic Fault
We believe the data presented here shows that people join, stay in, and leave cults on their own responsibilities, even if their decisions may have been influenced or affected by deceit, pressure, emotional appeal, or other means. We do not believe the evidence supports the mind control model. In this article we express the concerns and fears of conservative, evangelical, and knowledgable counter-cult apologists not only our own concerns but those of other counter-cult workers (Christian and non- Christian) who firmly believe that the mind control model misdiagnoses the problem, mis-prescribes the solution, and (for Christians) is contrary to a biblical cult evangelism model.
Those holding to the mind control model have made the generalization that most cults have internal social pressures and religious practices which, if not identical in nature, are similar in effect; and that average cult members are similarly affected by these teachings, techniques, and practices. We reject this generalization, though we will grant -- and in fact have stated publicly -- that many cults have made deceptive claims, used faulty logic, misrepresented their beliefs, burdened their followers with unscriptural feelings of guilt, and sought to bring people into financial or moral compromise to unethical demands. Yet it does not necessarily or automatically follow that these pressures, practices, or demands remove an individual's personal responsibility for his or her actions.
The cult mind control model assumes that a combination of pressure and deception necessarily disables personal responsibility. Exit counselor Hassan recognizes that the cult mind control model (which he has adopted) is incompatible with the traditional philosophical and Christian view of man as a responsible moral agent:
First of all, accepting that unethical mind control can affect anybody challenges the age-old philosophical notion (the one on which our current laws are based) that man is a rational being, responsible for, and in control of, his every action. Such a world view does not allow for any concept of mind control.
Objection: The Double - Bind
Hassan provides no means of knowing, testing, or proving whether people who are under emotional pressure, personal stress, or actual deception are in fact "not responsible" for their actions or not making free choices. Nor does Hassan suggest any way to clearly determine when techniques of "influence" or "persuasion" might become so great that one being influenced is no longer responsible, no longer rational, or no longer has a personal will. Medical doctor J. Thomas Ungerleider and Ph.D. David K. Wellish show the fallacious presuppositions used by the deprogrammers (now exit counselors):
If the member never does renounce the cult then he or she is regarded by the deprogrammers as an unsuccessful attempt or failed deprogramming, not as one who now has free will and has still chosen to remain with the cult.
Whether this is called this circular reasoning or a "double-bind," the net result is that the "proof" that the cultist has been coerced is unfalsifiable, and he cannot prove that he has freely chosen to join his group. If you leave the cult as a result of deprogramming (or exit counseling), that proves you were under mind control. If you return to the cult, that proves you are under mind control. The standard for determining mind control is not some objective evaluation of mental health or competency, but merely the assumed power of mind control the critic accords to the cult.
Recently certain of the model's proponents seem to blur the definition of mind control, perhaps because there is no corroborating evidence that mind control techniques produce qualitatively different results in religious conversion.
It appears that some evangelicals especially have problems reconciling a classic cult mind control model with other religious considerations and with later developments in this area. For example, sociologist Ronald Enroth, an evangelical professor at Christian Westmont College, is reluctant to be perceived as a mind control model advocate, even though he his support appeared clear in the late 1970s and continues at least tacitly today.
Enroth promoted the model in his 1977 book Youth, Brainwashing, and the Extremist Cults and also in a 1977 Christian magazine article, "Cult/Countercult." His most recent book (1992), Churches that Abuse, is peppered with language concerning victimization, lack of personal control, and autocratic decision-making control. Additionally, he endorses the work of other mind control advocates such as Hassan (1990) and Singer, and serves on the editorial advisory board of the pre-eminent mind control model journal, Cultic Studies Journal, edited by Langone. In a personal letter to us he describes Martin and Langone's Christian Research Journal "Viewpoint" article as "a helpful correction to the earlier article and it, too, reflects my own thinking re exit counseling, even though I have never personally witnessed or engaged in formal exit counseling."
Despite these several apparent (sometimes tacit) endorsements of the mind control model, in the same letter to us he declared, "You do NOT have my permission to represent my 1977 writing about thought reform and brainwashing as my current position on the topic. That doesn't mean that I necessarily disavow what I said then; it means that it is not academically/professionally current and I have not had time nor inclination to update, in writing, in this area."
Geri-Ann Galanti and co-authors Philip Zimbardo and Susan Andersen reflect this change in the recent book, Recovery from Cults, edited by Michael Langone of the American Family Foundation.
Galanti says that mind control (which she equates with brainwashing) "refers to the use of manipulative techniques that are for the most part extremely effective in influencing the behavior of others." These influence techniques work to change our beliefs and attitudes as well; we encouter these pressures constantly "in advertising, in schools, in military basic training, in the media." They are a part of the socialization process, a part of life, Galanti maintains.
Yet when describing her own visit to a Moonie indoctrination center, where contrary to expectations, she was allowed plenty of sleep, food, and to observe horsing around among the Moonies (some even joking about brainwashing!), Galanti concludes: "What I found was completely contrary to my expectations and served to underscore both the power and the subtlety of mind control." While she was there, she felt much of the experience to be a positive one.
Later, Galanti decides that what she really experienced, despite all evidence to the contrary, was an even more seductive, subversive form of mind control than she'd previously imagined could exist. It nearly fooled even her. In short, the lack of evidence for mind control among the Moonies was really evidence for just how insidious their methods of mind control had become! Such argumentation points to the frustrating nature of the belief in mind control; so often evidence offered against the mind control model is mis-used to illustrate how true it must be.
Zimbardo and Andersen offer a mind control definition similar to Galanti's: a tool to "manipulate others' thoughts, feelings, and behavior within a given context over a period of time . . . " The chapter deals at length with common uses of manipulation so that definitions of mind control techniques multiple to include anything from flattery to social etiquette to hard-of-hearing salesmen. Again, the move is apparently away from seeing mind control as insidious, powerful techniques that rob individuals of personal freedom, and toward a new, "broader" definition which sees mind control as a synonym for "means of persuasion." However, if mind control loses its distinctive power and unique techniques, then it ceases to have any relevance as a term descriptive of special cult indoctrination processes.
By almost interchanging the terms "persuasion" and "manipulation," Zimbardo and Anderson gloss over ethical, connotative differences between these two terms. Second, and more important, the new trend to define mind control to include nearly all "manipulative techniques" implicitly contradicts a key element of the traditional model, namely, that mind control renders its subjects unable to think rationally or choose independently.
A definition of mind control that removes its involuntary component is intrinsicaly at odds with the prevailing teachings of Singer, Langone, Hassan, Martin, and others that cult victims are unable to think for themselves or make decisions. Instead, it is more in agreement with the case we have been arguing -- that cult members are capable of independent thought and rational choice-making, but because of factual and spiritual deception, faulty presuppositions, fallacious reasoning, and improper religious commitments, they make unwise choices and adopt false beliefs instead.
Contemporary mind control model advocates want to have the best of both worlds: They want to distinguish cult recruitment techniques from normal socialization activities to substantiate their claims about the insidious powers of the cults, even to the point of pressing for anti-cult legislation; But as soon as anyone asks for concrete evidence and qualitative definitions, mind control becomes just another term for the myriads of forms of non-candid persuasion.
Objection: The Brainwashing Evidence
In addition to philosophical and logical problems with the cult mind control model, the evidence contradicts it. Neither brainwashing, mind control's supposed precursor, nor mind control itself, have any appreciable demonstrated effectiveness. Singer and other mind control model proponents are not always candid about this fact: The early brainwashing attempts were largely unsuccessful. Even though the Koreans and Chinese used extreme forms of physical coercion as well as persuasive coercion, very few individuals subjected to their techniques changed their basic world views or commitments.
The CIA also experimented with brainwashing. Though not using Korean or Chinese techniques of torture, beatings, and group dynamics, the CIA did experiment with drugs (including LSD) and medical therapies such as electroshock in their research on mind control. Their experiments failed to produce even one potential Manchurian Candidate, and the program was finally abandoned.
Although some mind control model advocates bring up studies that appear to provide objective data in support of their theories, such is not the case. These studies are generally flawed in several areas: (1) Frequently the respondents are not from a wide cross-section of ex-members but disproportionately are those who have been exit-counseled by mind control model advocates who tell them they were under mind control; (2) Frequently the sample group is so small its results cannot be fairly representative of cult membership in general; (3) It is almost impossible to gather data from the same individuals before cult affiliation, during cult affiliation, and after cult disaffection, so respondents are sometimes asked to answer as though they were not yet members, or as though they were still members, etc. Each of these flaws introduces unpredicatiblity and subjectivity that make such study results unreliable.
Objection: Low Recruitment Rates
The evidence against the effectiveness of mind control techniques is even more overwhelming. Studies show that the vast majority of young people approached by new religious movements (NRMs) never join despite heavy recruitment tactics. This low rate of recruitment provides ample evidence that whatever techniques of purported mind control are used as cult recruiting tools, they do not work on most people. Even of those interested enough to attend a recruitment seminar or weekend, the majority do not join the group. Eileen Barker documents that out of 1000 people persuaded by the Moonies to attend one of their overnight programs in 1979, 90% had no further involvement. Only 8% joined for more than one week, and less than 4% remained members in 1981, two years later:
". . . and, with the passage of time, the number of continuing members who joined in 1979 has continued to fall. If the calculation were to start from those who, for one reason or another, had visited one of the movement's centres in 1979, at least 999 out of every 1,000 of those people had, by the mid-1980s, succeeeded in resisting the persuasive techniques of the Unification Church."
Of particular importance is that this extremely low rate of conversion is known even to Hassan, the best-known mind control model advocate whose book is the standard text for introducing concerned parents to mind control/exit counseling. In his personal testimony of his own involvement with the Unification Church, he notes that he was the first convert to join at the center in Queens; that during the first three months of his membership he only recruited two more people; and that pressure to recruit new members was only to reach the goal of one new person per member per month, a surprisingly low figure if we are to accept the inevitable success of cult mind control techniques.
Objection: High Attrition Rates Additionally, natural attrition (people leaving the group without specific intervention) was much higher than the self-claimed 65% deprogramming success figure! It is far more likely a new convert would leave the cult within the first year of his membership than it is that he would become a long term member.
This data, confirming low rates of conversion and high rates of disaffection, is deadly to the mind control model. The data reveals that the theory of cult mind control is not confirmed by the statistical evidence. The reality is that people who have very real spiritual, emotional, and social needs are looking for fulfillment and signficance for their lives. Ill-equipped to test the false gospels of this world, they make poor decisions about their religious affiliations. Poor decisions, yes, but personally responsible decisions nontheless.
As Barker summarizes, "far more people have left the very NRMs from which people are most commonly deprogramed than have stayed in them, and the overwhelming majority of these people have managed to leave without the need for any physical coercion."
Objection: The Anti-Religious Bias Of Mind Control Assumptions
Although most secular mind control model advocates deny that they are critical of any particular beliefs, but only of practices, Shupe and Bromley note, "It quickly became apparent that brainwashing served as a conclusionary value judgment rather than as an analytic concept."
A look at the historical evidence underscores the anti-religious basis of the brainwashing/mind control model. As sociologists Anthony and Robbins note,
[I]n a sense the project of modern social science, particularly in its Enlightenment origins, has been to liberate man from the domination of retrogressive forces, particularly religion, which has often been seen as a source of involuntariness and a threat to personal autonomy, from which an individual would be liberated by "the science of freedom" (Gay, 1969). This view of religion had been present in the cruder early models of brainwashing such as Sargant (1957), who saw evangelical revivalism as a mode of brainwashing, and who commenced his studies after noting similarities between conversions to Methodism and Pavlovian experiments with dogs . . . (Robbins and Anthony, 1979).
William Sargant, approvingly cited by many cult mind control model advocates, also made statements arguing that Christian evangelistic preaching techniques are similar to communist brainwashing methods. As Sargant wrote in his Battle for the Mind:
Anyone who wishes to investigate the technique of brain-washing and eliciting confessions as practiced behind the Iron Curtain (and on this side of it, too, in certain police stations where the spirit of the law is flouted) would do well to start with a study of eighteenth-century American revivalism from the 1730s onward. The physiological mechanics seem the same, and the beliefs and behavior patterns implanted, especially among the puritans of New England, have not been surpassed for rigidity and intolerance even in Stalin's times in the U.S.S.R.
Sargant's anti-Christian bias is also reflected by Flo Conway and Jim Siegelman, 1970s popularizers of the cult mind control theory. Expressions of offense at the exclusive claims of Christianity appear in their bestselling book, Snapping. Some born-again Christians "shocked us considerably," they state, for telling us that "we would be condemned to Hell for the opinions we expressed and the beliefs we held." Among groups cited as suspect by Conway and Siegelman was Campus Crusade for Christ. The two miscontrues as a threat what Campus Crusade founder Bill Bright describes as conversion to Christ: "surrender of the intellect, the emotions, and the will -- the total person." Conway and Siegelman conclude: "In its similarity to the appeals of so many cult recruiters and lecturers, this traditional Christian doctrine -- and the suggestion contained within it -- takes on new and ominous overtones."
"What is the line between a cult and a legitimate religion?" Conway and Siegelman ask. "In America today that line cannot be categorically drawn. In the course of our investigation, however, it became clear to us that many Born Again Christians had been severed from their families, their pasts, and society as a whole as a result of a profound personal transformation. It is not in keeping with the purpose of this investigation to comment on the far-flung Evangelical movement in its entirety, but our research raised serious questions concerning the techniques used to bring about conversion in many Evangelical sects."
Conway, Siegleman, and many other anti-cult workers presuppose the harmfulness of any religious allegiance that includes exclusivity and total commitment. Looking back in history, such anti-religious bias is not uncommon. There were those who thought Thomas Aquinas and St. Francis of Assisi were mentally incompetent to make their religious commitments.
In short, there is no objective, evidential way to define groups that are "good" (not using mind control) versus groups that are "bad" (using mind control). Without evidence, the accusation of mind control against any group or individual becomes a matter of personal bias. Once one points to particular doctrines, teachings, or practices as inherently bad, one has abandoned the supposedly religiously "neutral" position of the cult mind control advocates and must make religious judgments. Although this is not the focus of this article, we note here that as evangelical Christians we openly admit that we make religious judgments regarding the cults, and that those religious judgments are based on the Bible, not on our own subjective opinions or some concensus of social science professionals.
Objection: Creating Victims
Many people who join cults want to help the needy, forsake materialism, or develop personal independence from their families, not necessarily bad goals, although misguided by false cult teachings. The cult mind control model, however, attributes cult membership primarily to mind control and thereby denigrates or discounts such positive activities and goals, misaffiliated to cults as they are.
The mind control model also fails to give proper weight to the role natural suggestibility plays in making one vulnerable to the cults. Highly suggestible people are especially susceptible to religious salesmanship as well as many other "sales pitches."
The cult mind control model instead focuses on victimization, that a cult member joins as a result of mind control and not as the result of personal choice. Adopting a "victimization" perspective actually strips the cult member of his capacity for rational activity. The cult mind control model epitomizes a "victim" mentality. Hassan explains his approach to counseling a cult member:
First, I demonstrate to him that he is in a trap -- a situation where he is psychologically disabled and can't get out. Second, I show him that he didn't originally choose to enter a trap. Third, I point out that other people in other groups are in similar traps. Fourth, I tell him that it is possible to get out of the trap.
This kind of victimization is very popular in our society today, although it has not demonstrated any evidential validity nor any ability to set the foundation for emotional or mental health.
Problems with the cult victimization idea can be illustrated by looking at other areas outside the new religous movements. We have the Bradshaw "model" of adults as "inner children" who never grew up because of their "dysfunctional" families. We have the many twelve-step spawned derivative groups where members seem to focus more on their powerlessness against whatever addictive "illness" they have than on another twelve-step maxim: personal responsibility. And we have the many "Adult Children" support groups where members uncover the sources of all their problems -- dysfunctional parents.
One of the most visible applications of the mind control model today is in the area of repressed memories of early childhood abuse (of satanic ritual abuse, simple child abuse, alien or UFO abduction, past lives, etc.). Amazingly, the mind control model is used to describe two contrasting portions of this problem. First, therapists and clients who believe they have uncovered previously repressed memories of early childhood abuse believe that the original abusers practice mind control on their victims. One of the most extreme examples of this is psychologist Corry Hammond, who postulates a sophisticated system of mind control he believes was developed from experimental Nazi systems.
Second, falsely accused parents and other family members often believe the mind control model, applied to the relationship between the therapist and the accusing client, explains how adult children could sincerely believe and accuse their own fathers, mothers, brothers, uncles, and grandparents of performing unspeakable horrors on them as children, including human sacrifice, rape, incest, mutilation, etc. Many times these adult children have publicly denounced their parents and refused any contact with them for years. Surely to believe such outrageous fictions, they must be under therapeutic mind control! Finally, once adult "survivors" come to the realization that their memories are false, they must deal with the reality that they have accused their loved ones of horrible atrocities. One alleged survivor, struggling to maintain belief in her alleged recovered memories, acknowledged this painful responsibility:
I wish I could say that I knew [my memories] were 100 percent true. But I can't. If they are all based on falsehoods, I deserve to be damned, and that is really tough. I've made some really important decisions that have affected a lot of people. I still get back to [the feeling that] the essence of the belief has to be true."
How could they have ever caused their families such anguish? They must have been victims of therapeutic mind control!
And yet, such a view fosters a crippling victimization that says, in effect, "you couldn't do anything to prevent this insidious mind control" and, consequently, what could you possibly do to protect yourself or your loved ones in the future?
Speaking about cults, Barker makes this clear, saying,
Those who leave by themselves may have concluded that they made a mistake and that they recognized that fact and, as a result, they did something about it: they left. Those who have been deprogrammed, on the other hand, are taught that is was not they who were responsible for joining; they were the victims of mind- control techniques -- and these prevented them from leaving. Research has shown that, unlike those who have been deprogrammed (and thereby taught that they had been brainwashed), those who leave voluntarily are extremely unlikely to believe that they were ever the victims of mind control.
An improper victimization model, whether used to understand cult recruitment, repressed memories, adult emotional distress, or false accusations of abuse does not provide the education, critical thinking apparatus, or coping mechanisms necessary to protect oneself from further victimization, and, most importantly, such theories do not focus on the life-transforming gospel as the ultimate solution.
Additionally, true victims, such as small children, victims of rape, robbery, or murder, those who truly are unable to predict or prevent their victimization, have their predicament cheapened and obscured by those who are not truly defenseless victims.
This model has become standard for many evangelical Christians who have therapists, attribute their current problems to "dysfunctional" relationships, and trace their personal inadequacies to emotionally harmful childhoods (everyone's a dysfunctional "adult child" of alcoholism, or abuse, or isolationism, or authoritarianism). Everyone is a victim. One doesn't need to be saved from one's own sins as much as from the sins of others. Psychology and sociology have replaced Scripture for understanding human behavior and developing emotionally and spiritually healthy persons. Yet nowhere in Scripture do we find support for the idea complaint first voiced by Eve that "the devil -- or the cult leader -- made me do it." One cannot remove human responsibility without also destroying human morality:
Some social scientists object to the idea that humans are free to choose. They claim that man is nothing but the result of biological, psychological, and sociological conditions, or the product of heredity and environment. Thus, B. F. Skinner holds that autonomous man is a myth. All of man's so-called "decisions" are actually determined by previous experience. Even some Christians believe that all of men's actions are determined by God . . . . , and that they have no free choice.
Such a view of man must be met head-on. If free choice is a myth, so is moral obligation. C. S. Lewis notes that a deterministic view brings about the abolition of man. In an impassioned plea he argues that you cannot strip men of autonomy without denuding them of responsibility: "In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful."
Objection: Theological Inconsistencies
If the cult recruiter's skill at manipulation is considered so coercive that members are not responsible for their own beliefs, actions, or even the decision to join/stay in the cult, then many biblical affirmations about personal responsibility and decision-making are jeopardized. To a secular mind control model advocate, this may seem a trivial objection. But several advocates are Christian evangelicals and must come to terms with the theological inconsistencies introduced when the cult mind control model is adopted.
For example, in the Garden, Satan personally appeared to orchestrate the temptation of Eve -- and who could be more persuasive? Our first parents succumbed to the temptation and were cast out of the Garden, and all of humanity thereafter have been penalized by this primal sin. If our first parents could be held morally responsible when confronted by the Ultimate Tempter, how is it that we seek to excuse ourselves or our offspring when confronted by human tempters of far less power, skill, and charisma?
Moreover, we observe that both Adam and Eve were penalized alike, even though the temptation was very well different for each. Eve's temptation was mediated by the direct approach of Satan; Adam's temptation occurred via his wife, and we are not told that Satan appeared to Adam as he did to Eve. Yet, regardless of whether Satan's presence was immediate or remote, firsthand or secondhand, both shared ethical culpability for their action.
It is also instructive to note that the second sin of Adam and Eve was blameshifting, the attempt to elude personal responsibility. Eve blamed the Serpent, and Adam blamed Eve. Though God loved them deeply, He did not accept this rationalization then, and He will not accept similar excuses made today for our own wrong beliefs and behavior.
Conclusion
This carefully focused evaluation has shown that the Bogey Man of cult mind control is nothing but a ghost story, good for inducing an adrenaline high and maintaining a crusade, but irrelevant to reality. The reality is that people who have very real spiritual, emotional, and social needs are looking for fulfillment and significance for their lives. Ill-equipped to test the false gospels of this world, they make poor decisions about their religious affiliations. Poor decisions, yes, but decisions for which they are personally responsible nonetheless.
As Christians who believe in an absolute standard of truth and religious reality, we cannot ignore the spiritual threat of the cults. We must promote critical thinking, responsible education, biblical apologetics, and Christian evangelism. We must recognize that those who join the cults, while morally responsible, are also spiritually ignorant. The power of the gospel (Romans 1:16) erases spiritual ignorance and provides the best opportunity possible for right moral and religious choices. "So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed" (John 8:36).
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