The noisy brain is well known concept among mental health professionals. Dr. John Ratey expanded on that concept in his book, Shadow Syndromes. Autism can lead to a condition where most of the brain generates an electrical storm when someone touches those who have it. Schizophrenia causes overload from too much mental noise. Teens with ADHD notice when they are on Ritalin that the noise level drops. One son told her mother when he got back from school after taking Ritalin, “Mom, it’s so quiet!”. Mentally ill people generally have noisy brains from a genetic predisposition. Often stress can set in motion a psychotic break when a person can no longer tolerate the noise aggravated by stress.
At the second Hope and Recovery Conference I attended, my wife and I were sitting at a table during lunch with a young woman working in the mental health profession. I had realized from my experience with those who were mentally ill that the standard mental illnesses, such as Bipolar Disease, Schizophrenia and Psychosis involve distorted perception. The young woman said she always knew it: It made sense. She was very unhappy when she couldn’t demonstrate that she had ever thought it about it before.
That’s the trick, you know: People say things others immediately recognize as an aphorism, and they believe that they have always believed it. This is, of course, distorted perception.
Distorted perception certainly seems to be implicated in a noisy brain. Moreover, as the “noise level” in the brain increases, the person usually becomes dysfunctional.
Organizations often seem to be victimized by distorted perception resulting in a high noise level which leads to a completely dysfunctional environment. Communications break down from the noise, there is a lack of standards, there is no auditing of results or ongoing processes; in fact, there can be no measurement of any kind of metrics, since nobody seems to know what the immediate and long term goals are.
Armstrongists have a firm belief that they know where they are going: The Kingdom of God! Armstrongists know how to get there: Keep the Ten Commandments — along with a whole lot of other stuff they can’t prove that’s required. Armstrongists know the future because they have the only roadmap on the face of the earth — the one created for them by Herbert Armstrong. To tell an Armstrongist that he or she does not have a clue will only end up their telling you that you have “A root of bitterness” — a self fulfilling prophecy if there ever was one.
What the Armstrongists don’t seem to understand is how utterly pathetic and directionless they are. They got that way because of the very common structure found universally among those with noisy brains:
- Lack of planning
- Lack of commitment
- Lack of communications
- Autocratic control
- Arbitrary change in direction
- Noisy brains [a tautology here!]
- Unrestricted flow of ideas
- Lack of discipline
- No documentation
Armstrongist community leaders are infamous for these traits.
It can’t be healthy.
Anyone going back through the history of postings in The Painful Truth should begin to get a pattern of the scenario that results from the noisy brain. For example, one man working at Ambassador College noted to his superiors that there were patterns to income. What a concept — that there were reasons for the ebb and flow of money, and, if they noted, analyzed and graphed the waning and waxing of the dollars, associated with various events during the year — such as feast offerings — the administration should be able to plan. He was rebuffed, of course. No planning required. Just have faith in God: He will provide. Of course, Proverbs does advise us to be diligent to know the state of our flocks and herds, but Armstrongists don’t actually use Scripture for a practical guide in their lives. They are fools: They only listen to what they want to hear.
That is why, when you point out that British Israelism is a lie and Herbert Armstrong was a false prophet — 1975 never happened — they bluster about how we should respect Herbert Armstrong because he brought us the truth. The truth?! Wait! What?! Hey, hey now. Let’s face it: He just made stuff up. Mostly. Or robbed other people’s ideas and pretended they were his. Two weeks ago I talked with a minister of the Church of God Seven Day. He brought up the fact that Herbert Armstrong plagiarized material from their booklets and then the Worldwide Church of God sued the Church of God Seventh Day. It didn’t get far when the CoG7 produced the booklet they wrote in the 1930s from some file in a basement somewhere. But that’s the danger from all that noise, you see: They make big mistakes because of the delusions from their distorted perceptions. This isn’t to say that the Armstrongist community leaders are mentally ill. It’s more complicated than that. They are also often criminals.
All of the noise leads to chaos.
So many things in the Armstrongist community make no sense at all: UCG wanting to relocate near a Superfund Toxic Waste Site [now there’s a real failure to plan]. How about the front page of The Good News with that picture of the latest, greatest tool of God’s Work, the IBM Data Cell. It was back to the hard disk drives within the year because the product was a failure and not such Good News after all. The Armstrongists are terribly inconsistent. Sure, they keep the Sabbath. Then they go out and make their manservant and maidservant work for wages on it. That is not consistent with Nehemiah and Ezra. If you’re going to keep the Law of Scripture, then you need to use all the Old Testament Scriptures, if you expect to be an effective Old Testament Christian.
The folks who worked in the Data Processing Center at Ambassador College told me of the internal chaos in the Data Center there. They had to roll with the punches. One described how they had to stack chairs on top of tables and work there while a channel was cut in the cement in the floor. And you have to know, not all of those runs on the Sabbath were totally unattended, though most were.
People would be accepted for a job at Ambassador College, sell their homes, pack up, move clear across the United States, only to discover that their job with the church had disappeared on the way. This didn’t just happen once.
I remember well in the local church, a girl who had appendicitis. She could not get treatment from a doctor. She survived, but her health was never what it should have been. Just 10 years later, the church changed the doctrine so people could see doctors and “be healed” by them. The ministers were advised to hide the faith healing to prevent the church from being sued: Lie for the sake of the church.
The real indication of how chaotic the church really was, though, lies in the fact that Garner Ted Armstrong committed date rape against, by his own estimate by 1972, 200 coeds. In spite of the fact that his father knew about this [and even though he claimed he didn’t, he was still culpable — but, then, he really did know] and was an accessory after the fact. These were criminal acts. Herbert Armstrong covering it up was a criminal act. They should have all gone to prison. Roderick Meredith — that paragon of virtue [in the utterly ironic sense] — also knew about it, did some mental wringing of his hands, gritted his teeth, and preached sermons about keeping God’s Law. The men who attended AC and became ministers knowingly married the women who had been raped. Then they went on to allow themselves to be directed by the very man who had raped the women who had become their wives. This, in turn, resulted in a great deal of bitterness and years of anger for those ministers who compromised themselves by keeping quiet, saying and doing nothing, tolerating the intolerable, pretending to be good friends with GTA and Herbert Armstrong, all the while driving themselves to distraction with the noise of the dysfunctional environment leading to the utter chaos. Now some of them, at least, have a psychiatrist treating them for clinical depression. That is something of an irony, given the teaching of the original Radio Church of God.
The Armstrongist community makes no sense. Furthermore, they can’t prove that they can get you to the Kingdom of God. The leaders are of no worth, and, today, are struggling themselves to come up with a reason for their own being. There doesn’t seem to be much more than keeping their salary, trying to keep a cushy but dysfunctional job and getting retirement. That — and for some of those in the upper echelon of the so-called leadership, which is nothing of the sort — basking in the glow of people who worship them in their idolatrous admiration. Furthermore, even though they know all this, they won’t change a thing. They don’t to risk anything left of the Armstrongist Empire of which they may still have a piece.
It’s like the Keystone Cops and the Three Stooges trying to maintain the Winchester Mansion.
You really should ask yourself the question, just how can these people make my life better? They don’t seem to be doing a very good job of running their own lives. Why should we expect anything at all from them except noisy dysfunctional chaos?
The best peace you can have is moving as far away from the Armstrongist community as possible, for, if you keep drinking from the poisoned well, you will take on their chaos.
Another good article, Mr Becker. Noise. One of the things I realized while I was in the old WCG was that, after, I became a larger part of the membership, there were constant activities planned, processes for separation of “manhood” from “womanhood”, purely mehanical contrivances that not only fostered certain types of behaviors of each sex, but the constant activity kept us from stepping back and questioning the truth and meaning of it all.
It was the shedding of the “self”, which is proclaimed in all religions, in exchange for the cohesiveness of the group. Hoffer described it better. He called it “estrangement from the self”.
Douglas, you’ve done an exemplary job this month. I don;’t claim to have absorbed every word perfectly, or I wouldn’t be going back and rereading your posts. Thanks for contributing your insights. We all leaned lessons and came to see different things. This sharing is invaluable in the healing process.
One has to sympathize with the desperation the Armstrongist ministers must face. They gave their lives to this cause. They have no skills or background for survival in the world at large. They are getting older with each passing day. They have no porfolio of investments to fall back on. The thought of the gravy train coming to an end must be terrifying.
I faced the terror at age forty. I still couldn’t build a cushion of comfort for myself, but I can survive. I can hold my head up and know that I turned my back on the lies and deceit.
Those who compromised may be better off materially, but I sleep well at night. I still have regrets over the lives I helped mess up but take comfort in the fact that it was not deliberate, and when I saw the putrid mess for what it was, I got out. I repented. That’s what sets us apart, gave us the courage to face the unknown future and gives us what peace we now have.
It’s a con. You don’t get the promised goodies.
As you might have guessed, Armstrong-ism won’t really give you immortality, not even if you give them all of your money, and your house, and your credit cards, and then recruit some more paying members for the cult.
And you don’t get the promised benefits from any of the other cults, either. You just get used and abused and taken (and then often, when your money is gone and you become disillusioned, discarded.)
The cult wants to own you.
The cult wants your life. The cult wants all of your money; they consume all of your time; they want all of your heart, mind, and soul.
One of the most obvious and visible problems here is “too many meetings.” They want to occupy all of your spare time. They have meetings, and then they have “Bible study” or “training classes” and also lots of prayer and fast sessions, and then they have assemblies and conventions (which are a “stench” to the Lord) and then some more meetings, in an endless cycle. And somewhere in the midst of all of that you are also supposed to go out and participate in the various fund-raising drives like store inventories.
The cult also wants to control you. First, they want to control all of your time, and then they will try to control more and more parts of your life: your sex life, your diet, your choice of reading materials, your choice of jobs, your consumption of drugs and alcohol (both legal and illegal), and sometimes even what doctor-prescribed medications you may take. Yes, the cult keeps you busy indeed! In the end, you can’t make it without the cult. They ARE YOUR LIFE!
Uniqueness of the movement follows……
Movements will usually extol their superiority over others. After all, there should be a strong reason to select that particular group. Some present themselves as being the sole way towards salvation, or being God’s chosen people.
New movements will advance a variety of reasons for their uniqueness. Herewith a few:
* Do not pour new wine in old bottles.
* God’s apostle, his message to mankind for this particular time.
* Impending disaster (pollution, nuclear war, famine, financial collapse) calls for drastic measures. Salvation reserved, only for faithful members.
* Fresh interpretation of the bible thanks to insight / revelation of the current leader.
* Esoteric tradition, now revealed.
* New doctrine / insight based on latest biblical understanding, reveals truth.
* Only those following this particular work on self, discipline, or belief, will reach the Kingdom, and be released from earth’s satanic ways, etc.
* Preparatory group (the 144,000) chosen for the coming of the messiah.
Noteworthy is the vehemence with which groups stress differences between each other. The more closely movements share an outlook, the more virulent the attacks on their rivals become, much more so than on other groups which follow completely different beliefs. This manifests itself especially when groups split.
Al, I might not know much [and given the gag orders from those in authority, such as those from work, I can’t say much], but I appreciate that you seemed to have followed the path of integrity, and that is something that no one can take away from you. There are a lot of smart people who engage with this forum. It is my hope they don’t just look and leave, but they take the examples and use them so they can sleep at night too.
Your point about courage is key. Now that I think of it, I should have written about courage. That, too, is what sets you apart from many of the others. Frankly, living in the cesspool is an outright act of cowardice.
I used to sympathize with the desperation of what the Armstrongists face, but, you know, after being subjected to their deliberate oppression after they formed their own little nests away from the Armstrongs, I can truthfully say that they really don’t deserve sympathy. That is what sociopaths want, while they commit heinous acts. What UCG ministers did to the couple with that stalker is reprehensible. To the point: The minister who was behind all that actually worked in the business world as an engineer. He was fairly high up among his peers at Lockheed. So don’t give me “they have no skills or background for survival in the world at large”. The ones near the very top through “middle management” or as I like to call it “muddle management” may have been like this man. The crud rose to the top, and those who were successful in the dysfunctional Armstrongist community would have been just as successful in the dysfunctional corporate community because — and here it comes — except for the name on the door, you really can’t tell the difference.
Note that the Merediths, Flurrys, Rittenbaughs, Lukers — this goes on and on — have made out quite well for themselves and may actually be living very close to the standard of living to which they had been accustomed to. Even in the Grace Communion International, note that while some of the ministers, such as Larry Pate only make $6,000+ a year, and he kept his day job, many of them are still on full time pay, such as William Miller [he’s in the Seattle area, and, yes we all wonder about that name, but I’m not bothering to ask — my bad for not going the extra mile of reasearch for no particularly good reason].
Those who stuck with the Armstrongist community as leaders are simply following the lazy safe path of least resistance — a total lack of the Holy Spirit and courage. But then, didn’t we all sort of suspect all along, way down deep inside, that they were probably tools of the Devil [in what ever form you want to cast it], set to do evil to the innocent? I think at some level we all sort of knew that, though we never really recognized it until more recently in our lives. And looking at our own failure to launch is oft the most difficult task of all.
Al,
You can read Mr. Beckers articles here:
http://www.hwarmstrong.com/enemy_mine.htm
Oooooooh! Meetings! I fogot the meetings.
Aaaaaaak! Aaaaaaak!
WCG. Weyerhaeuser. Both the same.
Aaaaaaak! Aaaaaaaak!
Well, you know, there is some retribution in this world. It may not be that comforting, but Armstrongist leaders are still stuck in endless pointless meetings!
I remember overhearing Dennis Luker talk to someone in the parking lot after Bible Study about the 360 degree review. That is the corporate methodology for personnel punishment: You are there and your peers, supbordinates and superiors get to pick you to death once a year on paper! Ooooh! Sweet revenge! And remember, I was the one who brought United the whole corporate thing — including the 360 degree review. I hope they still have them. In the County at least, they were abandoned long ago in the realization that “continuous improvement” just isn’t going to happen year after year on a personal level. The people who are good at their jobs continue to be good at their jobs. Period. They might not exactly be perfect, but they continue to get the job done — and pretty darn well at that. Why aggravate employees by making them try to do something that requires overpowering effort with no actual return on investment?
But then, if United [and the others] want to reduce or eliminate meetings, they can start with a proposition and have endless meetings about reducing the meetings.
Revenge is sweet, even if you aren’t there to appreciate it!
“Al,
You can read Mr. Beckers articles here:
http://www.hwarmstrong.com/enemy_mine.htm”
Ah, James, that was subtle!
What I find interesting is that the Armstrongist community does not want you to have your own ideas — such as Dave [rat] Pack effectively telling teens that they are not to have blogs, websites, tweets. They are worthless. They don’t have a say.
I say the real deal is this: They are wicked evil and don’t want people to catch them in their lies, deceptions as being immoral, unethical and illegal. It isn’t just a cushy job. It’s spreading their own brand of filth and evil to the world — and no one else has a RIGHT to commit crimes and take people’s lives and money like they do.
Taking people’s lives [over]. Isn’t that murder?
Yes, it is murder. Slow murder with a slow poison.
Do you remember HWA’s formula for spiritual growth? Sudy an hour, pray an hour and meditate an hour. Who ever had that kind of time? I certainly didn’t. What would be the purpose? Why to keep you feeling guilty, and if you tried, you had no time for thinking on your own. Early on, I relaized it was crap, and that he certainly couldn’t be doing what he advised himself.
Not to mention the formula for financial growth: Send 10% of your gross wages, save 10% of your gross wages to go to a drinking party once a year for eight days, and once out of every three years, send 10% of your gross wages to fuel the Armstrong jet for joyrides to photo ops.
In 1974, a number of us in the Gtreenville, SC area church met to discuss what we had learned from WCG BS. Several of the members had the same story. The more they prayed, they said, the more anger and resentment they felt for the time spent. I had this same feeling myself and worked harder to overcome, only to experience more anger and resentment.
The anger and resentent was my mind seeking to regain its “self”, only that was the very thing Armstrong told us we must suppress.
WCG BS — it took me a few seconds to sort out the BS part.
Yup, that’s how it always works. Remember the old cans of “Bullshit Repellant” they used to have for gags? Wouldn’t it be great to attend those same meetings now and pull out a can and start spraying?
Ralph: “The more they prayed, they said, the more anger and resentment they felt”
Al: “Study an hour, pray an hour and meditate an hour.”
Your time IS your life!
Control of human communication through control of the environment.
In all mind control cults, an ahuman model of perfection (HWA)is held out.
Pure and impure are defined by the ideology of the leadership.
The demand for purity is intense (follow cult leader as the example of purity.)
The model of perfection (“Study an hour, pray an hour and meditate an hour.”) is simply impossible to attain, because it is too idealized, too lofty, too perfect. Someone would have to be a living saint or an angel to be that good and Herbie was not a saint or angel by any means!
The main page has been updated along with a fresh email.
http://www.hwarmstrong.com/email_111.htm
Along the same lines as Mr Becker and you guys present, I read an inspiring speech given by a high school valedictorian.
This young lady already sees the garbage of all hierarchical systems, and told the students about it.
Amazing speech for a high school student.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/pr/valedictorian-against-schooling.htm
Try again. My lazy fingers.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/pr/valedictorian-against-schooling.html
If that don’t work, just go to lewrockwell.com and click on the article about rotten schools.
A couple of quick observations:
Ed Mentell, originator of the PT website, once confided in me that he had been one of those whose promised Pasadena job had evaporated. And, I knew several others who had this happen. It seemed highly unethical that the church would do this to people at that time, but I learned over time that headquarters was not immersed sufficiently in Christ’s teachings to even care.
Also, in the film industry, the recording industry, the Mafia, and in some areas of industry, sex is used to assert power. In some cases, it is almost expected that someone more powerful than yourself is going to “f*#k” (there really is no other word for this!) your wife, girlfriend, or even you yourself to demonstrate his power. But, that’s “in the world”. You certainly don’t expect this type of behavior from your supposedly Christian church, or allegedly deeply converted evangelists.
After three decades, I’ve arrived at a totally different course from many of you, and actually enjoy prayer and Bible Study, mostly because it’s something I do voluntarily, and not because I’m being brow beaten into it. But when we were given specific edicts, and were expected to either obey or be classified as Laodecean, I have to say I had a very difficult time maintaining a very good attitude about these activities. Back then, we even had the annual pictorial booklet which was produced each year at the ministerial conference, covering all of the ministers, their titles, and areas of responsibilities, and these were placed strategically in all of the prayer closets in all of the church owned buildings in Pasadena. And, these fine folks had the gall to ridicule fine Catholic people “taking a few laps” around the rosary beads.
For years after leaving the church, I had had nagging thoughts as to whether WCG really had been “God’s True Church”. Fortunately, over the past ten years, God has helped me realize that there is no way possible this could have been true. There were too many teachings counter to actual, verifiable Biblical principles, and a veritable toxic waste dump of bad fruit!
BB
I’m sure you won’t agree, BB, but dominating over others is the primal instinct of all primates. We have many animalistic drives still in our gene makeup. The creationists will denounce what I’m writing, but let them explain how a loving god put all those evils in our psyches if he is really so loving.
I’ve long equated Mexican gang graffiti with dogs marking bushes, fire hydrants, etc. It’s nothing more than instinctual, animalistic territorialism.
If you were ever jealous and angry over a rival’s interest in your girlfriend, you were exhibiting the same kind of thing. Too often, those drives get totally out of control and mayhem can be the result. There was a lot of mayhem in the WCG.
The recriminations from the Armstrongist community against me have already begun. These have taken the form of “Satan is the accuser of the brethren,” “Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee,” and “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God”.
They have been going on to explain that we should be subject to all higher powers and not speak against our government leaders — nor should we speak against ministers of God. Usually, this is accompanied by the dialog in Acts: “Then said Paul, I wist not, brethren, that he was the high priest: for it is written, Thou shalt not speak evil of the ruler of thy people.” Paul apologized for calling the High Priest a “whited wall”, even though he was one.
So the Armstrongist community rule is this: You have no rights to speak out against anyone — anyone at all — if you are not a minister of the Armstrongist churches of God.
However, if you are an Armstrongist minister, you may speak out against your members, leaders of government and leaders of other Armstrongist groups. Well we all remember Gerald Waterhouse calling world leaders names like “Mousey Dung” and “Hokey Minn”!
Then, of course, there is Scripture itself. We seem to remember the Apostle Paul saying a few things about the Apostle Peter. While we aren’t allowed to curse anyone, but render good for evil, the Apostle Paul cursed Elymas the Sorcerer so he was blind for a little season. Jesus said, “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s bones, and of all uncleanness.”
Then there’s the indirect approach: “This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;
Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.”
I simply have been following the dictum of the Apostle Paul, “Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them.”
For example, Roderick Meredith has caused divisions. Oh, boy, has he ever caused divisions. Not just divisions, but offenses contrary to doctrine. Beyond that, I have followed what Jesus himself said:
Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.
The Epistles have quite a lot to say about making public people who do wickedly. Should we not do what the Apostle Paul said in I Corinthians 5 about the man who committed fornication? How does that not compare with the UCG stalker in the church?
If they had been policing themselves as they should have been, no one would have been able to bring any of this up, would they? I’ve given them two whole years without any sign of them making the slightest move to do one thing to correct the evil amongst them.
It just seems to me that if I am to be judged harshly by the ministry of the Armstrongist enclave, they should first cast out, not just the beam in their own eye, but the MINISTERS WHO BREAK THE LAW. And, as I have said before, this isn’t just God’s Law here. They are criminals who should be put in prison. Instead of doing what Scripture says to do, they make it a big secret not to be discusseed and whiten the graves their victims are buried in.
It is altogether too convenient for them to come out of the woodwork now, like an infestation of termites, and make accusations against me based on their own convenient interpretation of Scripture.
We were told by Rex Sexton several months back that the Moslems will never apologize for what their Islam brothers did on September 11, 2001, because the Koran forbids them to say anything bad about anyone in Islam promoting Islam by any means possible, no matter how heinous it is.
I think that we see the same thing in the Armstrongists, I really do.
I really doubt that they are brothers; they are not friends; they are certainly not family. I have my doubts that they are of God, but, then, you know, Michael the Archangel was not permitted to insult Satan the Devil. Are the Armstrongists, then, admitting that we are really dealing with Satan the Devil? I will leave that to your imagination.
And I also believe that by their leveling their subtle but persistent accusations against me, they condemn themselves.
“There was a lot of mayhem in the WCG.” And the occasional murder.
It’s quite a cosmic joke, you know — Armstrongists believing they will rule over others as gods.
I understand the Mormons came up with this nonsense before he did. I haven’t researched it, but it’s my understanding that they believe they will become gods and rule over planets assigned to them. Makes as much sense as Herb’s spoutings, and I suspect he got the concept from them. Of course, he never would have admitted it.
Yep, just looked it up on Google and they do believe something along that line. http://listverse.com/2008/02/04/top-10-bizarre-mormon-beliefs/
My studies of late tie in with your statements, because I’ve been delving into law, how it developed generally, how it became what it did in the US.
Some say Paul was trying to make sense of this “Jesus thing”, which may well be true, but he did come up with, once you get rid of the Mithraic bullshit attached(and which was combined in Roman Catholicism),something quite useful in all levels of human social organization: you are dead to the law.
Now, many would say, “Oh he was only talking about the OT law of God. He wasn’t talking about being dead to human secular laws now”.
Interesting thing about common law. A perusal of Blackstone will reveal that common law totally rejects all Roman civil law as an authority, as well as Roman canon law, from any pope.
So, if Paul says, “We are dead to the law” we are left with some pretty good authority that we are not subject to “corpus juris civilis”, the body of civil law, nor of Roman catholic laws, of which most religions are based to some degree.
Under common law, neither religion nor men have power over you.
I remember quite well the “Study an hour, pray an hour and meditate an hour.” Try as I may, that always left me feeling inadequate and unable to measure up. Looking back I now understand; that was exactly the point!
Vaughn, very succinctly stated! We did it because it produced exactly the feeling of inadequacy, which made us feel guilty, which made us try to compensate, for which we never had time.
Like a drug, religion is the “opium of the people”!