Results may wildly vary, should be their disclaimer.
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Bhalakilya is a disciple of bhaktivedanta (the group that Butler essentially brought with him to iskcon and quickly took back/left with him when the Swami died). a butler boy through and through from the start. When I was young he was hittin o'duoulls with other older devotees. There was even some scandal where they started rolling Tulsi leaves and smoking them. I don't recall the detai
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Hi zizlz, yes, so many thought provoking tid bits that really struck me about so called spiritual seeking and guru culture. It has its place no doubt but the art is seeing when it ceases to function uniquely to your personal realization and understanding. Because then you are just doing on account of abstracts put forth by a guru who is completely out of touch with reality. Anyway, glad it&#
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

I think ya'll might like this book – "Advaitaholics Anonymous: Sobering Insights for Spiritual Addicts" Yes butler's got this covid vaccine thing right. Gotta give praise where parais is due. LOL.
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Run amigos, run.
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

That Upanishad is not proof. It's a highly disputed, questionable work. Chanting a sanskrit word has no magic power. None. It does not solve any life issues, give one any entrance to a cow planet or provide spiritual growth or an intimate relationship with any god in any realistic and meaningful sense of what it means to have a relationship with someone. If it makes you feel good, go for it.
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Cult leader Jagad Guru Siddhaswarupanada Paramahamsa Chris Butler of the Science of Identity Foundation used to criticize his male and female followers using volgur sexualized language like "cunt, bitch, whore, prostitute, dyke, faggot" and many there derogatory terms publicly in front of his followers. It was almost like a power play masquerading as "Gurudev disciplining his disci
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Like her charlatan guru, Tulsi Gabbard is an expert at playing the field and appealing to the dull-minded:
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Anyone seen this series on Hulu? Just wondering if it's any good.
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

A powerful observation by an early poster on page 4. These were the years the cult started suing various people and scare them into silence. yoursister Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I am astounded by the defenses of this "teacher's" > advocates. From my own experience I find their > blatant invasion of the rights of "individ
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

The barely mentioned vishnu of rig veda better not quite his day job. He's done a piss poor job being the protector of children, born or unborn. Plus, what does it matter, if you're not your body? Isn't it the fetuses karma to get killed in the womb? Dewatcher, Dudley, et al., Abortion is a fact of life (in the animal kingdom infants are killed regularly if they are weak or
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Whirlwind—happy travels. I can't infinitely regress with you about this stuff. Suffice it to say I appreciate your verve and commitment. I don't agree with you. We can agree to disagree. Hope some folks find inspiration in your version of things and others in mine. I just want people coming here to not be afraid they will be bombarded by what they are already used to from being in the c
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

That is your version of what you believe to be Krishna Consciousness Whirlwind. That is by no means what Krishna Consciousness means to Prabhupada and his ardent followers and other Gaudiya groups. Not by a mile. The Krishna conception is very specific (sectarian is an understatement), its process very specific. If it was what you describe, then it could have just as well been called garden va
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Hi whirlwind, I appreciate that you have verve in your beliefs, but I hope that you understand that they are genuinely wasted on me. I unequivocally do not hold the god Krishna to be a real person. As much as the quotes above reveal a genuineness of desire on the part of these teachers to portray a universal religion, it's not something that I believe in. I don't believe in the auth
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

As an aside, most devotees I know are nice folks and genuinely sincere and as far as cults go, I think it's become more mainstream like Morman's to the effect that many practice it outside the temple/ashram structure which is often where a lot of the cult aspects are more prone to happen. However, I do think that the way some kids are raised in it makes it hard for them to ever feel
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Whirlwind, I would actually encourage them to "start" from scratch. Yes. There is a lot of insight gained from shedding and abandoning one's religious past. God won't be disappointed and it's an authentic way to shed some of the trauma as a lot can get bound up in the details of the belief system that we tend to never confront and only address from the angle of the rel
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

The Whirlwind, don't you have 16 or 64 rounds to chant or something? There is no difference between one religious fantastic and another. You choose to live in fantasy. We choose to live in reality. Bhaktivedanta and his sampradaya are a throng of dillusional nuts who produce more delusional nuts. They reject basic reason and science, make up stuff and hope to go to the cow planet goloka
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

The Whirlwind, And so when you say that all this is "nonsecterian" and a person who wants true knowledge needs to find a living teacher in one of the 4 hindu sects of Saivism, Shaktism, Vaishnavism and Smartism, you are speaking of a nonsecterian path? It's disingenuous to say the path of "krishna consciousness" is "non secterian". If you mean to say that
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

DeWatcher, The vedic and post vedic works are full of promises of karma being destroyed or a person receiving immediate liberation by virtue of any number of engagements: Surrender to a bonafide guru, chanting some mantra, praying to some god, bathing in some river, fasting on some day, reading some book etc. There is not a shortage of promises of being absolved from any number of maladies. An
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Basically, DeWatcher, what Sridhara Maharaj is saying in those pages is that the guru is not really responsible for the disciple and does not take on any karma. What he is saying is that it's up to the interpretation of the disciple's understanding of scripture to figure out what the guru is saying is right or wrong or distorted etc. The moral of the story, without getting into the
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Beware, this is a complete scam. www.tulsialoha.org Butler has created a political mascot. There is a personality cult that's evolved within the cult related to Tulsi gabbard. Not to mention a pretty vast support base of QANON conspiracy nuts. Who in their right mind would donate to this person? She's done nothing with the money except buy expensive equipment, transportation
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

And first and foremost the pure devotee must be a "he", apparently. And as if there was not enough of your typical redundancy in that list, you have to basically deal with what amounts to a description of a robot. And what exactly is such an automoton "expert" at? The endless vagueness of this list and obviously subjective nature is akin to the style and open ended interpr
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Leaving this one here: The great singular Authority for establishing the superiority of the Bhagavatam is the "Vedas". Yes the same "flowery ones".
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Does that include the power of the he okay name, guru, and myths about krishna? There's some flowery claims made about those too.
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Nice article and great explanation of guru and temple culture. Bhaktivedanta was very vocal about building ISKCON temples in every city. It was a goal of his that followers took very seriously. Ironically, it's not even vedic as this article points out. Yet they will use "vedic" and ancient as a major preaching tool to gain recruits. Butler has focused much of his preachi
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Jai Wittgenstein!
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Great videos by Gaura Rader: and I just find it curious how they need to fall back in Jesus (or yoga nidra, hatha yoga, ayurveda, guitars and bongos) to make their cult look more relatable and appealing to both themselves and newcomers. I don't see any christians using krishna as a way to appeal to followers. And it's crazy they go as far as suggesting christ is brahma, a hindu go
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Good read:
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

Yes and they'll quickly slip in telling you that jesus is lord brahma or something made up. They'll tell you all sorts of stories about how Jesus went to India and met various bhakti acharyas. I don't no any Christian cults or sects that try to pedal that Krishna met up with Jesus on the sly.
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"

And here we have Butler's puppet compalining about cancel culture when she has made a literal career of it, starting in her early days of Stop Promoting Homosexuality Hawaii with her father where they proposed electroconvulsive therapy for gay teens. And let's not forget that anyone who finds Butler's cult as abusive, detrimental, offensive and idiotic is cancelled as a Hindu
Forum: "Cults," Sects, and "New Religious Movements"