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Ring barer
In regards to rituals and ceremonies there where several I was involved in and knew about while I was in…. here are a couple…
First the covenant ceremony for me was a process of striving to show undying devotion to the “spiritual father”. At the point where the spiritual father saw you totally committed to them they would have a ceremony where you each drank from the same cup of wine and devotional gifts were exchanged… in my case a gold ring with the seal of a lion on it… then the spiritual father would explain that you are entering into a life long commitment to them and you are to serve them as they offer you spiritual covering… this is called the covenant… while this was my experience with Brandon and sense has been retracted and the both of us in full admission of how wrong it was it was a practice endorsed and taught by Mr. Cunningham… in fact he asked me about how the ritual went down and re-explained the commitment to me after the fact.
On another note Mr. Cunningham did a similar ritual with my wife several months prior to my ritual with Brandon in which she received a gold tennis bracelet as the covenant gift… sorry Mr. Cunningham the only human covenant she was ever really in was with me…
At the commencement of each of these ceremonial meetings both my wife and I were deemed “Spiritual Children” and encouraged to throw out all that we had received from our natural parents and start to receive our inheritance from our new “Spiritual Parents”… the main teacher on how this was to look at take place was Mr. Cunningham… in fact the only time Brandon and I ever talked about what it should look like was at Mr. Cunningham’s direction.
Another ritual preformed by Mr. Cunningham involved the time he shaved his head… he explained in a Soma class that he had shaved his head and burned his hair as an offering…
Everytime I hear this first hand testimony, it truly turns my stomach. I always wondered what those rings where. The person who discipled me had one and it must have been his covenant with Brandon. It is funny because I do not have much of the first hand testimony of these kinds of things but really knew that something was just amok with the way people were and how devoted they were to Tony and others in leadership. Although I was never a participant in something like you talked about Ringbarer. I was a participant in some little covenant relationship vows in SOMA which were a joke. They were nothing like you describe but they were covenants of mutuality where you look out for them and they look out for you. Problem was they were a ritual and joke. I tried but certainly no one was looking out for me when things were going bad or I wasnt showing up. I can also remember the person who discipled me and their unquestioned loyalty and submission to Brandaon. I think now both have seen how wrong and haywire this was. Also, Paul Childs was a leader in a ministry I participated in. He took Tony worship to the ultimate. I can remember that there weren't too many conversations with him that did not involve talking about what Tony was trying to do or accomplish. He even told me at one time that he was just waiting, If Tony told him to go plant a church anywhere he would go. He said he had to go. This is the same man that when I was having issues at home told me that "Even Jesus denied his own family". Talk about scripture quoted out of context. He also told me at this same time regarding my service in the ministry "If you can just hang with me through the summer, I will give you a break in the fall." As if I was serving him. Now this reflects bad on Paul but i know that that attitude and teaching is coming from Tony because I have sat through his teachings on submission and authority. I mean comon, Paul gave away a baby thinking he was in submisison to God based on Tonys teachings. Now that is sad and sickening.
And I do remember that every week was a different stupid little ritual or ceremony. Like running in the church and yelling. I didnt go to the Gap and part of the reason is because I never knew what stupid stuff they were going to do at Tonys prompting. Yea I know everyone believes it is God speaking but really it is Tony manipulating.
Anyway Ringbarer. Thanks for the firsthand testimony. I really feel sick in my stomach for the people who are still at Radiant Life and would submit themselves to Tonys teachings It seems some of these people are trying to say it is not about Tony but all they are doing is tranferring their submission to Tony to a submission to the church and the institution. This they think is godly. I am sorry. If you want to do the godly thing run out from underneath this man and his teachings.