Re: I think my brother joined a destructive church/cult...what to do?
Date: May 14, 2013 08:44AM
Sorry to respond so late...this is such a slow moving forum sometimes that its safe not to check all that often.
Anyway, Things have not improved with my brother all that much...you are so right, he is addicted to god. That explains it better than anything I have yet seen. He has addictive qualities as alcoholism runs deep on his father's side...so this explains alot really. Mom has given him a few verbal lashings about religious hypocritsy which have actaully helped some.
But on the other hand...he spends what time he is not working or going to church on reading religious inspired material that is pretty radical that basicly tell him to give up his entire life for god.
Sounds like you have a community problem in the works there. I also have no doubt that he used the adam and eve speech to verbally excommunicate a member...sounds like the whole speech was prepared around making the person who left seem like the "fallen one". 150 people already...thats not good.
There is a church like that around here that keeps going to bigger and bigger buildings and the pastor is a real tithe hound and has become really fundamentalist. I used to go to his church before I de-converted to atheism and it is an indie penniocostal church, but I never trusted him, so I left. He has a long history of drugs and illegal behavior that was "miraclously cured" after being zapped by the spirit. Gee, that sounds like the Brownsville, Fla guy, also a pennicostal church...is there a blue-print for this?
Anyway, I hope your mother sees that by going to his church, she is supporting this guy.
As for my brother, I see that I am in for the long haul....he has swallowed it, hook, line, sinker.
Thanks for the info,
Knotty