To brainout:
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Five more posts and I get 'pm' rights. I read the Forum Rules and realize there are no exceptions. Honoring rules is always beneficial. So here goes:
Well it's looks like you weren't just trying to get you pm rights, like you wanted everyone to believe, because here you are with many more posts than you need-speaking directly at the Thieme cult issue.
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I have seen some justification for some of the complaints in this forum about Berachah people, but in each case it was a problem of the people being too idolizing of the pastor.
This is false. Your blaming the victim.
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I've seen that (as have all of us) in other churches, too.
Don't speak for all of us because you don't know us. Remember also, 2 wrongs don't make a right. Just because 1 church does something wrong and another church does something wrong doesn't make it right.
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On the other hand, those who quit often become quite obsessed about getting others to quit, and will go to some lengths to push themselves on those who do not quit. They hound the one who stays so much, that the one who stays must choose between staying, and the one who quit. The one who quit, provides an ultimatum.
Actually that would depend. It could be that the one who is staying was the one who initially made the other listen, pushing themself on those who would not listen, and hounding the one who quit to listen, the one who stayed imposes the ultimatum between listening or the one who stayed-initially.
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So when it comes to whether or not a quitter is ostracised -- valid testing question for a cult -- it must also be asked if the one who stays is likewise mistreated, badgered, etc. for staying. In short, behaviors on one side or the other, aren't of themselves, determinative of "cult".
This is not true also. It's partially determinative. I have mine, but what is your testing for a cult?
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It's natural for a human being to be enthusiastic over a topic or person he/she ardently supports. It's even natural to become, for awhile, obsessed -- as it were -- but then the obsession gives way to the normal demands of life.
Where were you going with this? Your not making sense, it's not just obsession (in the context that you placed it) that gives way to normal demands of life, everything in life gives way to next demand, be that it's a person being happy, sad, obsessed, studying or whatever. Then you drop the paragraph and move on to the next.
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People who get in cults -- or think that OTHERS are in cults -- tend to have some emotional disturbance which such obsession seems to fulfill.
Here's where your way off. Cults manufacture cult members, not the other way around. The emotionally disturbed force in the cult, is the cult leader. Your trying to "blame the victim" of a cult as if they were responsible for abuse. I'll give you an example. A husband beats his innocent wife, because she won't submit to doing something evil. Ok Is the wife responsible for the beating? No she's not. The abusive husband is emotionally disturbed and the one dealing out the punishment. The wife is innocent. But now she becoming emotionally disturbed because she's either being beaten or forced to do something she doesn't want to. So you could say that the wife became emotionally disturbed because of an abusive action acted out on her. You could say that a cult member is emotionally disturbed because an abusive cult leader acted so on them.
So it's the cult leader who is dealing out the abuse not the deceived unwitting cult members who arrive at the cult with thier innocent faith.
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In the latter category -- those who accuse or imagine OTHERS to be in cults -- the individual is obsessed with someone else's enthusiasm, and often negatively. The sure sign is that the one who accuses or imagines, himself/herself is obsessive about 'saving' the object of the accusation or imagination. When this obsession is not met, the accuser easily slips into vitriol and even violence.
This is certainly possible. However not the only scenario. There are other scenarios possible to. The one who quits may not be obsessed with someone else's enthusiasm, they may and rightfully so, see the cult member as a danger to themself and danger to other family members and a danger to society in general. The one who quits may see this as a peaceful verbal attempt to stop unnecessary violence and abuse that a cult member is potentially capable of, before the one who quits has to resort to whatever justified physical force is necessary to stop them.
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So any claims about a cult need to be carefully analyzed with respect to the accuser's motive, too.
Sure ALL TRUTH is important. Most importantly let's not forget the cult leader's motive. Just because an accusers motive is anger and revenge doesn't mean that they are unjustifed in thier accusation. Say in the previous example the Father of the wife being beaten walks in as the husband is beating the wife. Is the Father angry? Yes he is. Is he justified in anger? Yes he is. Would the father be incorrect in accusing the husband in front of a judge that the husband is a wife beater? No he would not.
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In large measure, Christianity became the mainstay religion in the Roman Empire because it was persecuted as a cult.
Your main contention is false. There were many cults in Rome. After Theodosus declared christianity the sole religion of the empire, all other cults were persecuted. However, they did not spread as you contend. Persecution of cults often lead to people seeing the falsehood in the cult. That is the intention here.
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We all know about Romans 1, the dire statement that those who don't believe in God are left to their own delusions; that those delusions become rather horrible over time; that the person spirals down into a miserable life as a result. 1Jn2 spent time on how Christians who became negative, were troubling those still positive, as well.
"We all know"? Again you assume you know us. But delusions oh yeah like the misery of thiemites suffering from Thieme's delusions? I'd say if you didn't believe in God, it would be better to suffer your own delusions than the delusions copied from a cult leader like Thieme. Again the word "positive" is not used in the bible not in 1John2 nor anywhere else. However Thieme consistently used the word "positive" as "absolute truth" of his bible teachings. Just a note - The Nazis pre-WWII also used a form of christianity - called "positive christiainty".
Truthtesty