I'll do you one better and past below a letter in the works that chronicles the abuse... Homer and Ruby, This letter is about facts not truths. It is about reality. My hope with this letter is to help Cherie, Robbie and Hailey. I did not know whom to alert with this information. Dave and Nanny, Rex and Suzie I feared would be overwhelmed. I know you both care for the kids and fo
Forum: Destructive Churches

DOES ANYONE KNOW ANY OF THESE GROUPS? I believe these groups are affiliated to "The House of Help" network. 1. The House of Help Worldwide 2. Kosmon Church & its Prophets 3. Free Christian Youth Community 4. Help Mobile (Hong Kong) 5. Charismatic Leadership (Germany) 6. Movement of the Unity 7. Minister of the Gospel 8. Interdenominational Ministries
Forum: Large Group Awareness Training, "Human Potential"

Sedona is indeed a beautiful place to visit, but its spiritual underbelly is not a pretty thing. The place is full of bizarre new age communes, cults, and conmen. Hawkins is one more screwball crackpot to add to the mix. He uses his phony "testing" techniques to convey his support to any group, church or teaching which in return supports him and his own "work". His connect
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

I heard about Byron Katie when I was involved with the Unity Church several years ago. At that point, I was kind of overloaded with "new age" gurus and I was becoming jaded as nothing these gurus said transformed my life to the heights indicated by these self-proclaimed gurus. After gathering some information about BK on the internet, I felt very dubious about her. The one commen
Forum: Large Group Awareness Training, "Human Potential"

I have extensive experience within Religious Science, as I do with Unity. Both are part of the century-old "New Thought" movement, and as such teach very similar theologies. From my experience, RS is somewhat less "devious" and more transparent than Unity as an overall organization. RS people do tend to be more cold and clinical in their approach to spirituality. However, I do
Forum: Destructive Churches

QuotesupermonkeyAre they harmless? You have to ask yourself is going to the doctor a good thing? Is science real and I am not talking about what they refer to as the science of mind. IT IS NOT A SCIENCE but a false psdeoscience based on disbelief in logic and just good basic honest common sense My experience with Religious Science is that it is very similar to Unity (I have written about my
Forum: Destructive Churches

Quotemidonov123I want to add that this is another blantant example where landmark's philosophy breaks up relationships. I'm not as "invested" as others here because the friends I lost to Landmark were not terribly close to begin with, however virtually without exception, they all left their spouses or significant others within weeks or months of their Forum involvement. Often
Forum: Large Group Awareness Training, "Human Potential"

The AA "vocabulary" is deeply woven through many churches and various spiritual/religious organizations. In the Unity church, for example, a lot of church members (and indeed many of the ministers!) are 12 steppers, and so the AA lingo is already a part of Unity-speak. I've observed over the years that a group does not need a single leader to be a cult. The groupthink takes on
Forum: Clergy and Therapy Abuse

QuoteHopeThere is an alternative to AA that does help people. It is called Rational Recovery. It doesn't accept addiction as a disease that keeps people hooked on AA meetings, always wary of a relapse. Yes, I read a book about Rational Recovery several years ago, when a church I attended gave meeting space to every 12 step group in town. (I no longer attend any church, that being one &#
Forum: Clergy and Therapy Abuse

I can vouch for what Hope says about "alternative" healing or counseling "professionals" and even ministers getting people into the Forum. I saw it happen especially in new age churches like Unity, and it seemed to have a "viral" effect in that the people who went to the Forum seemed to draw in more and more people from the church, even including the minister. I
Forum: Large Group Awareness Training, "Human Potential"

QuoteQuestionEverythingVicarion, Thanks for your posts. You have a lot of insight into the Unity Church. As do you, QE!!! Mine comes from many years of participation and observation. Whatever one may think of the "original" Unity teachings, they have been gradually supplanted over the past 30 or 40 years with new age, self-help, pop psych speak. At least the "old" U
Forum: Destructive Churches

Vicarion, Thanks for your posts. You have a lot of insight into the Unity Church. In my experience, I think there is a desire to escape from and, at the same time, a tendency to recreate the dysfunction of one's childhood. For example, I was raised in a strict Catholic family. I knew that didn't work for me and as soon as I left home, I stopped going to church. However, I ke
Forum: Destructive Churches

Forgot to mention this: QuoteI knew a member of the Unity Church I attended who had taken the Forum. At the time, I really didn't know much about the Forum/Landmark. This man never tried to recruit me (or anyone else to my knowledge - at least at the time I was there), but it was very difficult communicating with him. It was almost as if he was from a different planet. I experienced the sam
Forum: Destructive Churches

QuoteThe other thing that bothered me about Unity was that every few weeks, another new age author/process would be the focus of the minister's sermon. They were open to everything except critical thinking. There were weekly meetings of ACIM groups, Reiki, the Enneagram, etc. Yes, and if you question or challenge any of this in any way, you are branded as "negative" or lacking in &
Forum: Destructive Churches

I knew a member of the Unity Church I attended who had taken the Forum. At the time, I really didn't know much about the Forum/Landmark. This man never tried to recruit me (or anyone else to my knowledge - at least at the time I was there), but it was very difficult communicating with him. It was almost as if he was from a different planet. The other thing that bothered me about Unit
Forum: Destructive Churches

I should add that, after seeing a number of fascinating and somewhat frightening posts on this BBS about the Landmark Forum, it reminded me that there were several people taking the Forum seminars from Unity, a lot of cross-pollination so to speak, between the two. Unity members took the Forum training and invited their Unity friends to the "graduation" (which I avoided, knowing it woul
Forum: Destructive Churches

Good for you for getting out of Unity! Yes, "magical/delusional thinking" is a big part of Unity. Like "manifesting" the right job, friends, business deals, even parking places. And the idea that no matter how terrible an event may be (the murder of a family member, for example) it is your own "lesson" to acept it as "good" and to forgive the murderer,
Forum: Destructive Churches

I was raised Catholic, but as soon as I reached young adulthood, stopped going to church. I became a "seeker," trying out new age philosophies and ideas and was a member of a religious science church for a couple of years, and then attended a Unity Church although I never became an official member. I did go through Unity's introductory seminar on membership. They showed a vide
Forum: Destructive Churches

Thanks, I know it wasn't anyone's fault. :) The point of my lengthy post was that from my many years of experience and observation, I see that Unity and even Religious Science churches have now fully embraced channeled books like A Course in Miracles, Conversations with God, and the Abraham-Hicks books, and given free time and space to book study groups, precisely because these books
Forum: Destructive Churches

Sorry about that. Must have been a server glitch somewhere. No one intentionally did that.
Forum: Destructive Churches

I logged in, wrote a lengthy post, and the forum deleted it (when I tried to post). Suffice it to say, both bozman and Cosmophilosopher are right on.
Forum: Destructive Churches

QuoterrmoderatorTimmer: You have offered no scientific evidence to support any healing claim or even cited research or tests to prove anything. Sai Baba is someone with a deeply troubled history of scandal. His "ideas," reportedly have been to prey upon boys and young men for sex using his "guru" status to gain undue influence and advantage. If this is evidence of enl
Forum: Destructive Churches

QuoterichardmgreenI know of the band, but I sort of lump them in with Ozzie Osbourne and Black Sabbath. It's a shtick. And as Jerry Lewis once said, "speak softly but carry a big shtick". Of course, rock music is very loud but ..... Sorry I believe he is real one of the few true cases. The Long Hard Road Out of Hell by Marilyn Manson and Neil Strauss (HarperCollins, 1998)
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

landmark UNITY the moonies what do they have in common? They are anti science and anti skeptical thinking. I am a former jehovahs witness turned cult Buster and i know what i believe as I have seen the results of mind control at work and the harm and horrible damage unity is not about medicine or proven FACTS it is a fairy tale wishful thinking and blind fantasy... fillmore was a croo
Forum: Destructive Churches

I attended a small church of Religious Science (Science of Mind) on and off for a couple of years. One of the things I was looking for in attending was a sense of community, and I never really felt like I could connect to any of the people in the group. It was also very one-sided emotionally in that only positive thinking/feeling was acceptable. Even though no one was mean about it, negative e
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Hey Boz, thx for the post. Yeah, i have atheistic tendencies, but that is not what this forum is about at all. Belief in God, or not, is a personal matter, and each person has to figure that baby out for themselves as best as they can. To me it seems, what matters is how these organizations work, and what they are doing to people. I don't know the motives of the Fillmores, but they we
Forum: Destructive Churches

Sad to say, much of what you say it true. I'm not quite where you are as far as the motives, etc. of the Fillmores are concerned. But I certainly lean more toward your view than I do that of Timmer. I'm not an athiest, but I've definitely moved into the agnostic camp. I know something's up with the universe, but I no longer trouble myself as to the exact details, and I hate
Forum: Destructive Churches

By the way, the dishonest charge that someone like myself is a type of Anti-True Believer is an abject falsehood. The reality is the exact opposite. I freed myself from the New Thought prison, and a few other mental prisons, by FOLLOWING THE EVIDENCE, and exercising Critical Thinking. By stopping "Believing" things, and carefully looking for facts. If there was proof that the Ne
Forum: Destructive Churches

Well, I am not going to waste to any more time with Timmer, as its obvious this person has zero interest in objective facts, and just in propagating the irrational New Thought dogma. I will just be blunt. What is it with the bullcrap about Myrtle Fillmore? Who cares? That is some ridiculous story written as a testimonial going back what, over a hundred years? Get real. First, where are t
Forum: Destructive Churches

The info about coerced, abusive sex with congregants on the part of a Unity minister was expressive of only one of the many problems that have been covered up by the Unity organiztion(s). Comparing it to the sex abuse scandal in the Catholic church is just setting up a straw dog argument. Unity and the New Thought movement is miniscule compared to the Catholic church, and its history is compara
Forum: Destructive Churches